I've never found FedEx to be as good to my door as UPS, but I lament what has happened to Amazon shipping. Where professionals used to deliver my packets, now amateurs show up in SUVs or rented box trucks. They leave the packages exposed to passers-by. They get their stupid trucks stuck in my driveway, ripping up the yard in the process. They lose packages in transit. Free one-day shipping with prime isn't worth this hassle.
Amazon's delivery service is a nightmare if you have an even remotely unusual situation. Packages to my apartment are supposed to go to the main office a block away, since there's no way for delivery drivers to get into the building. UPS, USPS, and FedEx are all aware of this and get it right every time. Amazon's drivers have never gotten it right. They either mark it as undeliverable or worse, leave the package right outside the entrance, on a busy street. I contacted them several times but it didn't help, so I gave up and started having my orders shipped to work. (They're not great there either - it's a coin toss whether they'll actually bring the package to our suite or leave it in the lobby.)
There's a real benefit to having regular drivers with regular routes - the drivers eventually learn these types of quirks.
I live on a private street. Amazon's "Amateur Delivery Drivers as a Service" routinely fails to find the private street, resulting in delays on packages arriving, and on numerous occasions, I have to go walk down to the end of my street to get the package from their driver.
I wouldn't be surprised if this came of amazon lowballing because they want to get (more) into Fedex's game.
The cost of shipping for Amazon isn't just the shipping cost - it's the opportunity cost of not scaling their own shipping business. I bet that's priced into their bid.
Similar goes for FedEx. If you're FexEx, you don't want more Amazon competition. You also like the scale/efficiencies from the Amazon business. So that puts their value of the deal at $$$_from_amazon + scale_efficiencies + amazon_not_in_your_game.
(I don't know what the marginal benefits of scale look like at that level - anyone know more on this?)
I could see FedEx better off taking a loss to keep the deal going. I bet either Amazon just tried to make that happen, or it's been happening for a while and there was just a change-over at Fedex.
The press release isn't very clear about exactly which contract isn't being renewed. Other news sources[1] indicate that it's specifically the air delivery contract. Not exactly a surprise with events like this[2] in recent memory.
If I was FedEx, I too would dump Amazon and let some other sucker deal with their race to the bottom demands. Having no pricing power as a vendor is a fool’s errand, and Amazon will steamroll you.
FedEx is only dropping their Express business. As cited in the link, they note, “FedEx has made the strategic decision to not renew the FedEx Express U.S. domestic contract with Amazon.com, Inc. as we focus on serving the broader e-commerce market. This decision does not impact any existing contracts between Amazon.com and other FedEx business units or relating to international services.”
That doesn't really clarify anything (for me)... What are the other business units? I've never gotten a Fedex Home Delivery pacakge from Amazon, are there other Fedex business units that ship for AWS?
"Green" FedEx is ground, which was an acquisition a long time ago. It's an all-ground service that uses trains and contract delivery carriers with FedEx livery. Slow and cheap. If you look at the door of the truck it will tell you who owns it.
The "Red" one is Fedex Express -- overnight, 2-day and 3-day service. Most people think of "Express" FedEx.
The sorting centers are completely different, since the methods of backbone transit are separate. Express only goes via airports (except for regional city pairs like L.A. to San Francisco). Home/Ground only goes by road/train, so you'd have to consolidate somewhere in between.
Also, a significant fraction of the Express traffic is stuff that is time-sensitive delivery. Things like getting signed paperwork so people can buy houses. They really hate delays. In fact, if you spring for the "priority overnight" they'll send a driver to your door with a blank waybill and envelope, and wait while you fill it out. It's quite a different service than Ground/Home.
Depends on how much time/trouble it would be to consolidate in time for that last mile. You could expend more effort combining things, than you would save in just doing the last mile in separate trucks.
I'm not saying this IS true, I don't know. Just that it is logically possible. Combining two different systems for a last mile delivery is not trivial.
Of all the shippers, I've found Fedex to be the most unreliable. UPS deliveries via Amazon seem to always arrive without issue but almost every Fedex package gets lost en route or is delayed.
We ship 75k shipments/yr across FedEx / UPS / USPS and, while I too have my own bias about preferred carrier, these kinds of preferences are usually pretty specific to locale.
Some people love the carrier you hate, and others hate the carrier you love.
If only there was a company large enough, doing business in enough locales, and with enough statistical and engineering experience to be able to find where one shipper worked better than another and recommend the better one for that locale... /s
Not to ignore the '/s', but you brought up a good point. We did add an unobtrusive disclose menu to our shipping tiers during checkout for customers to select their specific carrier if they'd like.
This seems to have worked pretty well for folks who have a strong opinion, and avoids the need make lots of guesses about what people like.
Generally speaking, the biggest shipping preference people have is 'Free'.
My younger brother is a professional musician, and last year he bought a boutique trombone case handmade by one guy in a cabin in Wisconsin, after over a year on the waiting list. Fedex got to his apartment building in Manhattan, realized they didn't have a code to get in, and left it on the sidewalk. My brother was waiting at home all day for this package, saw them drop it off, ran down, and it was gone when he got outside. Fedex wouldn't do anything about it, no refund, nothing. And if he had done a chargeback on the manufacturer, who wasn't really at fault, he wouldn't have been able to buy from him ever again.
Insurance is not a panacea. It wouldn't have gotten him moved up in the waiting list to receive a replacement quicker, and the claim likely would have been denied, and they'd have expected him to go through an appeals, which would be a pain, and might not get the result he wanted. A police report will probably be required. Even if successful, when insurance claims are made they often go to the CLUE insurance report, and make many forms of insurance more expensive or harder to get. https://www.carinsurance.com/clue-report.aspx
The other thing is that you're assuming there was no insurance. Maybe you're right but I doubt it, it was probably insured by Fedex and the uselessness of the insurance was included in "Fedex wouldn't do anything about it".
The "requesting a signature" part is something they often neglect to do, or do carelessly.
At any rate if the person making the trombone case can't be bothered to ship it properly, it's still Fedex's fault from the musician brother's perspective, because he knew firsthand that the driver failed to deliver the item directly to him.
I believe the shipper can require a signature upon delivery. Then, at least, if FedEx left it without getting a signature, they'd be on the hook for it.
Where "on the hook" is shipper files a claim through a byzantine manual process to get some subset of the wholesale, not retail, value. You can't file the claim until after a multi-day "investigation". So if you ship a replacement right away, and they find the original item days later...too bad.
Isn't that a function of the delivery option you chose? If you go for the cheapest "drop it outside and maybe it'll be gone" option then why would you be surprised? Around here people who live in apartment buildings where stuff can't be delivered get their packages sent to work. Also they offer insurance, right?
I've had decent experience with FedEx myself, mostly in Canada but also some other places.
I think it all depends on the context of where you live, personally. I've lived in multiple large cities in the midwest (USA), and can say that UPS was far superior in one of them, while Fedex was way better in another. Even different addresses in the same city had the same result. Doesn't seem like there is any rhyme or reason.
Mine has been the opposite.. UPS was supposed to pick up a package for return once. They showed up, wrote "I'll pick up this package tomorrow." on the package's box, and never came back. I called UPS customer support 3 days in a row, trying to get them to pick it up, until they finally showed up on the 4th day.
They've also delivered my packages to both of my neighbors on multiple occasions. Thankfully my neighbors were nice enough to correct the mistake rather than just keeping the items.
Same thing happened to me with UPS collecting a package
Someone stayed home from Tuesday evening onward, and they didn't manage to come and get it until Friday, despite calling them every morning asking what was going on
The person who eventually collected suggested our bell was broken and generously offered to test it for us - we had food delivered on Thursday evening so knew it was fine
And then before that there was the time I paid for 'guaranteed next-day delivery' on an envelope containing incredibly important documents which was only going to an adjacent zip code. Sent on Thursday and didn't show up until the week after, while UPS pretty much shrugged the whole weekend and said 'maybe we lost it?'
My experience is, UPS always arrives on time, Fedex sometimes a day late, USPS rarely arrives late, but if it's late, it's usually not arriving at all.
The worst, by far, is Amazon's own delivery service. Often late, frequently damaged, and inconsistent on when they show up during the day, if they can get into the building, and where they leave packages.
That's not been the case for me. USPS is by far the worst with UPS and FedEx neck and neck with one another. The only experience I have with DHL is with commercial air freight and they've been quite good as well.
Have you ever had to deal with lost packages? Good luck trying to make any progress with USPS. I've had several packages lost by USPS. Every phone call I've made to them results in conflicting answers and bad information.
However, I live in Seattle and Amazon's own delivery service is arguably even worse than USPS. They might not lose packages (they now take photographs upon delivery), but the workers aren't very well trained. I've had packages left out by my sidewalk garage or left out on an unsheltered table in my front patio area. A number of times the packages have been rained on. It's a general level of cluelessness that you don't see with UPS, FedEx or USPS.
Meanwhile I've had one lost letter with USPS (that now-empty envelop got delivered with an "apology"), no lost packages, but have had countless problems with FedEx and UPS. My favorite UPS experience was when UPS got a package to the regional sorting center (Oakland, CA) and then express shipped it to the east coast (where it arrived that day) and then told me it would take a week to ship it back to the west coast. Because fuck you, I didn't pay for two week delivery.
Oh, how about the time the newbie driver delivered the package to the wrong house? Have you ever tried to get through to a real person at UPS? Careful what you wish for. The only human UPS will willingly let you talk to is in some overseas call center — and they will have zero power to do anything and thus say whatever they need to in order to get you to hang up the phone. After managing to escalate that incident, the supervisor at UPS's San Francisco depot called me back and explained that the package had been delivered correctly. I realize I'm not the customer in this case, but, man UPS has done a good job of ensuring I choose any other carrier.
FedEx... bless them. Aside from offering up gun fetishist discounts (yuck) and being hardcore anti-union zealots, FedEx accepted a package from a vendor with two different delivery addresses on it. Yes, the vendor fucked up. But FedEx accepted the package and got it to the regional sorting center and just sat on it because they didn't know what to do. Zero effort made over a few days to call the vendor, myself, or the other person whose contact info was also on the package.
The only way I can get my FedEx packages is if I re-route them to a Walgreens or another drop point and drive there and pick them up myself. They never seem to be able to find my address while UPS or USPS never has an issue.
Lately, one Amazon delivery person (works for Amazon) I have has been terrible. Usually, they are fine but this one guy calls me with every package delivery he has for our building saying he can't get in the building and there is no one at the front desk. There is always someone at the front desk. This isn't really Amazon's fault but I imagine they track delivery success rate and this person will be gone eventually. Again, the other Amazon delivery people are fine but one specifically is bad.
For me Fedex was pretty good, straight UPS quite good, and UPS Mail Innovations (with USPS last mile) was a reliable way to get a package a day late, meaning chasing Amazon CARE for a credit that was usually worth more than the inconvenience of the packaging missing Amazon’s guaranteed delivery SLA.
OnTrac though, every single time they tried to use OnTrac, OnTrac messed it up. Always multiple days late, and always a challenge to track it down and get it. Haven't had them in quite a while though, so maybe they got fired already.
My personal experiences with FedEx in Switzerland:
very positive: a laptop from Lenovo from China + replacement keyboard from US + CD from Japan (because of some VAT-war I cannot buy anymore mp3s from amazon.com) during the last 6 months have all been delivered extremely fast and in perfect conditions.
I love FedEx' feature to be able to tell them in advance not to deliver the package at home (I work so I'm never around when they would come by) but at some shops nearby my home or nearby where I work or to just hold it back. The last time I used UPS it did not have these features (might have improved now).
Vendors can't find me because my address is half a block away from my actual unit. When they do find it, they pick one of two mail rooms, inside a random exterior door, in front of my door, or at the front desk.
The front desk is often not staffed and closes earlier than deliveries are out.
The front desk occasionally forgets to notify me a package arrived.
The delivery "lockers" sometimes don't email me.
The architecture and management of a building is very important for delivery success. It needs to be a "business address", it needs to be faithfully staffed, there needs to be delivery-only parking, and it needs to be obvious where a deliverer must go.
I have lived in places where this was done right, and several places where it was done wrong to my intense dissatisfaction.
Well, it sounds like delivery sucks for your particular situation, at least.
I have no problems whatsoever with delivery, either to work or to home. Home deliveries even manage to find the front of my door on the sixth floor of my apartment building, somehow.
One time I got really fed up with FedEx because when they delivered a package to me while I wasn't home, they dropped it off at the leasing office instead of taking it to the FedEx facility.
The leasing office closes at 6pm. The FedEx facility is only a few blocks away and closes at either 8 or 9. I got home at 6:30. Because of that driver's incompetence, I had to wait until the next day to get my package _and_ be late to work the next day because the leasing office doesn't open till 10am.
And this was something that was really time-sensitive, too.
This wasn't the first time they screwed up a delivery to me either. I will never do business with them again if I can help it.
You can have UPS and FedEx hold a package at one of their customer service centers or UPS Store / FedEx Office. If it's time sensitive you can also pay for morning delivery.
If you're ordering with Amazon, the phone app will notify you when your packages are delivered. You could probably create an app that pings the tracking information every so often for other sellers.
What do you mean "it was done wrong"? The idea of designing a place so packages can be delivered there at the exact same time that any working person is not present there is just bizarre.
I noticed FedEx seems very well partnered with Walmart right now: FedEx stores are now eligible pickup locations for the free store pickup option at Walmart.com.
This was pretty handy because getting in and out of busy Walmart's is a pain, and most FedEx stores are basically deserted at any given time.
Even when picking up at Walmart stores, I believe they were in FedEx packages. And this would be that two-day express shipping speed.
They have a partnership with Walgreens as well. Not sure the capacity but I have seen signs signaling that you can drop off FedEx returns to Walgreens.
Hmm... how often does a company fire a big customer? This would seem significant and probably related to either a pricing dispute or the fact that one way or another Amazon is encroaching on FedEx's core business.
I think this is more a "You can't fire me, I quit" kind of thing. I'm guessing Fedex wasn't willing to make the concessions Amazon wanted. Better to have the news story be FedEx drops Amazon than vice versa.
Given the depth of discounts for even 1 million parcels per year, it’s a safe bet the Amazon won’t be paying Fedex retail rates for any non-trivial number of customer orders.
Exactly. Fedex sees the writing on the wall and figures it might as well wring the last cent of profit out of the relationship (and who knows what profit was on it with the contract). In other words if they feel that Amazon will cut them out then what is the motivation to serve them at discount rates?
In a way this is similar to a commercial landlord with a tenant that wants to go on month to month. You take advantage of the opportunity and charge more rent for the accommodation. Zero reason for Fedex to not do what is in their strategic interest here it's business.
Interesting. That statement says FedEx is USPS' largest provider of air transportation to the USPS. But that's different from USPS being FedEx's largest customer.
They bring mine to the door, but half the time they reek so badly of cigarette smoke that I can't take the box inside because it'll stink up the house.
This hasn't been my experience. UPS and USPS always place the packages on my porch where it isn't really visible to people passing by, but the lame AMZN contractors always place it on the front door of the house, in plain view of the street.
Amazon just started sending me pictures of the package on my porch as part of delivery confirmation. Not sure I love this, tbh, but if many things had been stolen I guess I’s appreciate it more.
This has been useful to us because you can clearly show from the photo that Amazon delivered the device to the wrong house, and therefore a refund gets issued with no hassle.
I used to get around 25% of my Amazon packages from Fedex, now most come from Amazon's own delivery service, the rest either come from the USPS or UPS (or sometimes both - UPS delivers to the postoffice and the mailman delivers to my house)
I actually like Amazon deliveries. They leave the packages at the door (in this case I'm ok with) and send a picture of said delivery, verifying that they did indeed leave it at and not in the apartment main office (which is conveniently only open while I'm at work)
As a recipient, I like them - as a pedestrian and cyclist I don't, their drivers are horrible drivers, driving too close to cyclists, cutting off pedestrians on sidewalks, etc.I assume it's because they are under a lot of time pressure to make deliveries.
UPS drivers, despite the large trucks, seem to be much safer drivers.
It's a mix they use UPS, USPS, Fedex and now their own trucks/contractors vehicles all depending on which is cheapest at the moment. I do anecdotally get much more from all the others than from Fedex.
It’s a smart business move for FedEx to be the key scale logistics infrastructure for everyone not Amazon rather than be reduced to a dumb pipe for Amazon - a scenario where they would get squeezed by the monopsony buyer over time. I bet Amazon had terms and conditions which limited FedEx’s ability to go after both of these markets.
Lately I have observed that UPS has given up trying to re-deliver my packages if they don’t find me at home on their first try. They instead ask me to go pick them up from a UPS storage location.
I wonder if this is another sign of carriers getting fed up with Amazon.
Not doing retries is a cost thing -- last mile is expensive (human drivers, fewer packages) and retrying delivery multiplies that cost 2x, 3x or more. Bufferbox (YC Summer 2012) was trying to reduce this cost before Google Shopping acquired and shut them down.
I actually prefer this than the re-delivery attempts. Look, if something was "wrong" the first time it's probably going to stay wrong the next n times they try. I would just rather it be in a fixed location that I can pick up any time than wait another week or so until they give up.
Retail stores don't stock most of the things I buy online. Sometimes I try to find something local and give up. I need a 5mm glass fuse for a shredder. All the auto parts stores only carry 6mm. Box stores don't have small fuses. Amazon got the sale.
I got fed up with this since it was happening for about half my deliveries. I ask for a refund and let them return to sender after the package is done sitting at the storage location.
That said, whoever does the last-mile delivery in the Amazon-branded vans seems to do a good enough job for my easy-to-find house. And they tend to deliver in the evening, when I'm home, so the package isn't sitting out all day (though I'm sure this is a quirk of my location and the driver's route, not a feature).
I've found USPS service to my residence is fantastic when it's my regular letter carrier but I do give a $100 tip every year. Nothing fits in my tiny street mailbox (thanks HOA, I had a nice big box at one time) but she walks parcels to my door even if it's pouring buckets.
More likely Amazon not willing to pay for the redelivery attempt for the parcel. (Carrier contracts and line-item fees are quite negotiable, even way below Amazon’s scale.)
Personally, I hate FedEx with passion! They are the most unreliable, the most clueless and most difficult to work with. UPS never has an issue leaving packages by the door, whereas FedEx would always record a failed attempt to deliver. Last year I had a nightmare situation, where a case of wine was being shipped via FedEx and they "made an attempt" twice without bothering to leave a notice!!! (I suspect they weren't even at the right building). I ended up escalating it up the chain significantly to get it resolved but I swore to never ever ship anything by them.
Depends where you live. I have the complete opposite experience in San Francisco. UPS has lost packages left and right while Fedex is always on time and super reliable.
Might just be a contact negotiations fail - Amazon given their options might not be too keen on paying what FedEx demands and FedEx thought it would be beneficial to disclose first and control the narrative.
Alternatively put, FedEx might not be willing to grovel for what Amazon is offering.
Many moons ago I'd worked for some folks who'd sold a business to Amazon. I'd heard it said that the only relationship you want to be in with Amazon is as a customer, anything else and they will chew you up and spit you out in the most brutal fashion.
I wouldn't be surprised to hear that Amazon was lowballing FedEx to an obscene degree, especially given that Amazon is rolling out their own delivery operations.
'There is significant demand and opportunity for growth in e-commerce which is expected to grow from 50 million to 100 million packages a day in the U.S. by 2026.'
Yeah, that seems crazy. There are ~125 million U.S. households. We buy a ton of stuff from Amazon (not toilet paper, to be sure) and that's ~100 orders (so even fewer packages) per year. The average household is going to get an Amazon / Walmart / Costco package every single day?
The writing is on the wall, Amazon is going to be shipping everything themselves sooner than later. I think this just so that FedEx can focus on more profitable long term opportunities.
I do this myself, so I wonder if when humans are trying to minimize impact when communicating bad news, we pick language intended to diminish.
Why say "LESS THAN 1.3 percent" instead of just saying something like "1.28 percent?" You're already giving decimal-level precision. Why does "less than 1.3 percent" sound better for news like this than "over 1 percent?"
For the reasons you mentioned, I assumed that to meant some decimal between 1.2 and 1.3 percent. And rounding the the tenths is more than enough. I didn't quite take that to mean anything sinister, though I'd have probably worded it something like 'just under 1.3 percent' to express that, if for the reason above.
Ordered stuff online. FedEx says the package was delivered but I don’t see it. The online tracker lists the last location of the package in the city where I used to live. I assume I autofilled the wrong address or something. So I head down to my old apartment complex. They have my package. NBD, I’m able to pick it up without incident.
But then I check the shipping label on the package. It actually has my current address on it. And right below that is a “Corrected Address” label, with my old address. I double-check the online order. Turns out I gave them the right address. The retailer doesn't have any knowledge of my old address.
I call FedEx and ask what’s up. Turns out the sender gave them my phone number (presumably so they could call me if they had issues delivering — and indeed, my phone number is listed on the “Corrected Address” label, along with an alterante phone number I did not give to the sender). The CSR confirms that FedEx disregarded the address provided and “corrected” it to the address they previously associated with name + phone number. The CSR confirms that no, this was not something I signed up for or accidentally opted into. They just “correct” addresses automatically without asking. Even if the corrected address is in a completely different city and looks nothing like the given address. Because quality.
So apparently, everytime I move, I now have to let FedEx know where or else they’ll perpetually misdeliver my stuff. Lovely. And heaven forbid I try to send packages to my parent’s address or some other place that’s not the address FedEx currently has on file for me. Because just shipping packages to the address actually on the damn label is too damn hard for them.
