Watching USPS or UPS package travels

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Gary W. Graley

Gary W. Graley

“Imagination is more important than knowledge"
Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
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USPS seems to have a better display of what is happening with a package than UPS seems to, at least on the last couple that I've had delivered.

But, their routings always seem counterintuitive to me ;) and sometimes I feel like I'm playing Plinko or that show on tv called The Wall where you are yelling at the ball/package to move in the other direction, you know, the way it really should be heading?

I get it that there is some logic to how they route things but to see packages moving from south of you, to whiz past you to go further north and then to drop back down seems a long way around the barn and some times they bounce even worse, by heading past you towards the south again and then bounce back north.

But, you can make faces/yell or some hand gestures to no avail, it arrives when it arrives.

I've only had one package never showing arrival, it was to a PO box and I think it got there and was put in the PO box without being scanned. And, I never got the fellows letter with his check, so all in all a not so great transaction and the fellow doesn't show ever being back on line here, but he might have taken a new forum name, so it's difficult to tell. The USPS was no help, they said maybe it was knocked onto the floor at the sorter but no ones come back to confirm or deny it. :(
G2
 
For whatever reason Gary, USPS seems to be much faster and more reliably tracked here in Santa Barbara than on the East Coast.

Many times they come in a day or two early :) Never saw that in Baltimore!

UPS...not so much. Maybe tomorrow :rolleyes:
 
From what I've heard a bunch of hubs were consolidated. I have seen stuff go from Cali to WA state, then back to Cali and then North to me in Canada.
 
Chefget said:
For whatever reason Gary, USPS seems to be much faster and more reliably tracked here in Santa Barbara than on the East Coast.

Many times they come in a day or two early :) Never saw that in Baltimore!

UPS...not so much. Maybe tomorrow :rolleyes:
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Holds true for San Diego, also. USPS is faster and has better tracking. And they do occasionally deliver a day earlier than promised.
 
I have a package being delivered today from Amazon and by Amazon which seemed odd
So I contacted Amazon on chat to see how it was actually going to be delivered
They said it should be delivered today, does that answer your question?
Uh…no? Lol I said WHO is actually delivering it?
Is it some kid in a VW zipping around town?
And they said yeah something like that…
Wow lucky me, their time frame says it could be as late as 10pm to be delivered
Again…wow 🤣
Fortunately it’s for my wife and not too expensive
G2
 
So, the package was delivered today and an email with a picture of the package sitting on a porch.
Unfortunately it wasn’t MY porch! And the email asked “How’d we Do?”
Lol
Luckily it was one house down from us and across the street and we know the people there and got the package safely
Could have been a lot worse
G2
 
Just make sure you see the USPS guy scan the package.

USPS email notifications are very convenient, BTW.
 
Although I sent a knife to my son from my Louisiana address to his Louisiana address, and the Baton Rouge Distribution Center sent it to Spokane, WA, in general USPS is easier to follow than UPS for me. I do have to run down the delivery person sometimes and say, "Don't you have a package for me today."
 
Haven't bought anything recently requiring delivery via UPS or USPS but I've had my share of mysterious routing.

The winner is the pkg that was sent via UPS for delivery to my PO Box which was redirected for delivery to my house when do instructions to do so were submitted.

IMO, USPS (1st class and Priority) is currently better than UPS for time and tracking of deliveries.

I almost always use a AMZN locker for AMZN deliveries. Otherwise, I use my PO Box or home address for the pkg depending on its size/value. I haven't had any problems w/AMZN deliveries.
 
Well I mailed a package out to a friend that lives in Colorado Springs, he informed me that it arrived safely on Friday.
Oddly enough, USPS is still tracking this package saying that it would arrive on Saturday and shows it leaving Denver and now it shows that it was scanned arriving into the Colorado Springs area and will now be delivered on Monday!!!

I can’t imagine what it will say on Monday!

And my friend sent me a priority mail package that was supposed to be delivered to me on Friday but it still shows hung up in the Colorado Springs area and now says it has NO idea when it will be delivered, indeed if it ever does arrive!

Now some things are delivered in a blazing time frame, surprising both the receiver as well as myself

So grab those dice and give them a fling and see what fate can tell us about the next delivery day

🤣

G2

Late Breaking News! My package mysteriously jumped from Colorado Springs all the way to Rochester NY!
Which is a good sign that it might actually arrive on Monday or Tuesday
😇
 
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Blade Lab said:
My local USPS has this game they play when the driver gets behind and doesn't feel like finishing the route. Anything undelivered is coded, "delivery address does not exist," or "addressee refused delivery." Then it's delivered the next day. :rolleyes:
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This. I sometimes have expensive items sent to my business and was really excited to finally get a TRM, to be delivered the day after thanksgiving by USPS. I got a notice that day that stated something like "delivery attempted, business was closed", which of course it wasn't. I didn't mind it being late so much as the blatant falsehood. In the end this is not life changing stuff.
 
Blade Lab said:
My local USPS has this game they play when the driver gets behind and doesn't feel like finishing the route. Anything undelivered is coded, "delivery address does not exist," or "addressee refused delivery." Then it's delivered the next day. :rolleyes:
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Happened the same to me couple of times. I discussed that with the USPS customer service on this website and they promised it is not going to happen again.
The other situation was with the DHL, when parcel was returned to the sender as i refused to take it. That was a ridiculous situation cause that was a Christmas present for our little daughter from the grandparents. Why would someone even make up such an excuse?
 
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The weak link in all these tracking systems is where an actual human being has to manually scan something. Too many times it doesn't happen, or doesn't happen the way it's supposed to.

Eventually they will replace all these employees with robots. If we live long enough to see that glorious day, things will run much better.
 
We’re not too far from there

And the Colorado Springs package, that he opened up on Friday, shows this morning that it is out for delivery! Interesting indeed! Can’t wait to see what happens when it is delivered…again
Talk about a Groundhog Day delivery
🤣
G2
 
Well, spirit of the package shows delivered just now 🙃
It would be interesting to see what they say if he presents them with the notification and asks for the package please
😇
G2
 
Gary W. Graley said:
We’re not too far from there

And the Colorado Springs package, that he opened up on Friday, shows this morning that it is out for delivery! Interesting indeed! Can’t wait to see what happens when it is delivered…again
Talk about a Groundhog Day delivery
🤣
G2
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From what people on the other side of the wall have told me is that the online package tracking you see online is not some sort of massive Matrix style instant real time window on freight movement.

Instead it's predictive so they know normally something going from A to B takes 4 days so they feed in the arrival date and if it's going to cross any hubs and that makes people happy. The only way I could ever get actual real time last scans was to know a supervisor inside the company who could pull that info from their internal tracking.

Now that was a few years ago but it sure still seems to be the rule. I've had stuff listed as out for delivery tomorrow suddenly jump 500 miles back because of a highway closure or rarely had stuff arrive a couple days early.
 
Now that tends to sound like a probable situation, I know our delivery lady when I ask for a package she questions me 'does it show out for delivery?' and if it does, she'll dig in the back of the truck to find it, but, if it doesn't show out for delivery she says it isn't on the truck.

G2
 
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