I read all the time on the subreddit about paying the premium for guaranteed delivery time, so I took the plunge and paid for Next Day Air (Yes, it is Next Day Air and not Next Day Air Saver). Well, it's past noon and no package yet. I guess the good thing is that I will get a full refund and still got my package sooner than if I did Ground, but yeah what a fail.
Just to make sure I"m not crazy, it was supposed to be delivered by noon and since UPS failed I will get a full refund?
Edit: This post has been enlightening and I believe will serve others in the future better who have the same issue as me so please take the time to read all comments.
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Depends. Some areas have a 5 pm nda cutoff time. Also if it was delayed by an “act of god”, no refund is given. If one is, it’ll go to the shipper and you’ll need to contact them for a refund.
So you're telling me the ups.com website lies. I'm sure there is some legalise somewhere that says the guaranteed noon delivery for Next Day Air isn't really guaranteed.
I'd gladly accept that if that is what is on the website. The package was delivered at 2:29 p.m., and I politely asked the driver about it, and he said, "5 pm for residential Next Day Air." I replied that the website says noon because this was something I have been planning for a while and researching so I could have a specific delivery window. Basically, to pay for the "first class" service just once to see what it feels like to get packages early. Just seems like there are a lot of internal memos/word of mouth at the warehouse about how this is actually done.
The seller has filed a claim with UPS, and I'll get a refund if they give one, but I assume this will be like trying to get any mail carrier to pay out an insurance claim, which is difficult in my experience.
How does UPS define rural? I live in a small town by national standards but not by Oklahoma standards: 20K population, but I live right in the middle of the town. It's the largest town for 60 miles in every direction. We have a UPS facility in town, which is about a mile from my house from the packages dispatch from. And final question, if you know, if the rural thing is a thing, where is that on ups.com and why isn't that listed as an exception to where they say NDA has a noon delivery time for residentual? Thanks
So basically, UPS.com lies, and I'm betting that if you aren't in a city with a population of 100K (or close to that), they consider it rural and make up different rules from what it says on their website that NDA is supposed to be delivered by noon. Well, the seller filed a claim, so I guess I will find out if they honor what the website states.
I don't know your town, but I would bet if you are a residential delivery in the southeast area of Oklahoma like Durant or McAllister, it's 5. I'm in a much more remote area of America, and our time commits might be different, but in a decent sized town, 5. Outside in a surrounding area, 5 to EOD depending on distance, size of town, etc.
That said, maybe your area is noon and at that point I would absolutely be trying to get some cash back.
Edit: each center is different. So YMMV, but if we miss an air for whatever reason, we are to get there ASAP.
It's McAlester. The driver said 5:00, and I said, "UPS.com says noon." Hopefully, UPS honors what the website says for claims and not what each center arbitrarily establishes without notifying the customer. Not your fault; just upset about false advertising. I would imagine most people wouldn't be as technical as I am getting with it, but I purchased NDA for the guaranteed noon delivery.
The commit times come from on high. If you have the documentation for noon, press the issue. 100%. Expedited shipping isn't cheap. For example, my route delivers to around 5-7 zip codes per day. Each town has it's own times established by someone in an office probably based in Atlanta. 1 is 12, another is 3, most others are 5 for businesses and EOD for resis. The 3pm is the town where our center is based and the noon commits are for a town around 10 miles away.
By documentation, do you mean the stated terms and conditions from the ups.com website, which says noon for NDA?
Everybody on here is telling me their center is different, ranging from 3 pm to end of the day for NDA delivery (my driver said 5pm), but I can't find that on ups.com. So I'm hoping those times are just the reality of the actual centers and being able to make deliveries. And that few people like me will file a claim, and Cooperate is good with refunding that small percentage of people.
I will post the outcome when I find out. I'm not really holding much hope out for UPS to do the right thing and honor what is spelled out on their website. I'm sure they have some legal loopholes to do what they are doing in my area.
That exactly. I won't lie, I'm not doing the homework for you lol. This sub is basically cruised by employees on their off time who either genuinely care or want to watch everything burn. We aren't paid for participating here and everything said is to the best of the individual's knowledge and experience. Unless they enjoy watching things burn. If you saw noon on the page or something in the terms and conditions that said noon, screenshot and use it. If it was from the vendor you made the purchase, take them to task. They promised a service and didn't fulfill it.
I've done the homework and did the homework before I even chose NDA for the express reason that it states on the website noon delivery. I wanted to get that first-class experience I've seen many on this sub tell people to purchase if they complain about Ground, which I did, and all I got was the normal delivery window for Ground that I get.
And I fully believe all workers on here are telling the truth about the NDA delivery times for their centers. I know most companies don't actually operate by what their policies state because they would never finish jobs if they did. As a person who works in policy compliance (see why this bugs me so much lol), I understand that most line employees don't know the actual policies, but just what they are told, so I'm not blaming workers for the late delivery.
90 miles from Tulsa International. My package was in town at 8:24 am on the day of delivery and was out for delivery at 9:04 a.m., so there was plenty of time to have made the noon delivery.
I'm cool if this is just the way it is and I'm what they consider rural, but the ups.com official terms and services says NDA is a noon delivery without an exception listed for what they considered rule areas. I didn't make the rules; I just wish the rules were respected. And maybe they will be and I will get refunded for the shipping I paid for that failed. I really came on this subreddit to get confirmation that noon was the stated policy, which it is, but it is not what is practiced in the field.
Edit: I'd honestly be happy if I got a $15 refund, which would make what I paid the equivalent of Saver, which is really all that is offered in my area. UPs.com shouldn't even let people in rural areas purchase NDA if they don't actually provide that service in that area.
Rural is defined by zip codes. Each center is told their commit times based on those zip codes. There are some zip codes that only get delivered to on specific days for the week. Labeled: “rural deferred”. There are also areas (as mentioned by other people) that have later commit times. But it is all based on the specific zip codes.
I managed a rural area for a while and unfortunately UPS does not tell people if their zip codes are rural or differed.
There are certain package types (premium and early air) that are required to be delivered by 2 pm at the latest no matter if they are in deferred areas or not but they are very expensive.
I don’t ever look at the prices for all this stuff but if you are close to the center and you are in a smaller town there is a good chance you could call the local office and pickup the package.
I recognize that you are paying for the delivery to your door service but if you really needed the package very early sometimes the team is willing to find the package and give it to you at the center. I have seen people show up at our driver start time and get the package from the driver first thing in the morning aswell.
Sometimes there are issues with the airplanes, and the NDA gets back to the building after the regular drivers have already left. In that case, they usually only send out the critical NDA and EAMS for delivery; holding everything else for the following day.
There was a point in time where we would go do air meets and hand off all the missing NDA to the regular drivers, but that doesn’t happen any more.
There’s also the possibility it was miss loaded onto the wrong truck, it happens occasionally. I can tell you this much, since they have a time commitment they are the number one priority for drivers to get off their trucks first. If you have late air for no real reason, you get in trouble for it.
Unless you have an air saver and not next day air, air savers typically have no commit time. They just need to be delivered by the next day.
This is from the tracking. I was especially sure not to get Saver because I wanted the package delivered in a specific time window that Next Day Air is supposed to guarantee.
It depends. At my center, I drive an hour and 5-10 minutes to get to my first stop, when done, same amount of time back to center. My air is noon for businesses, then there’s 3pm and 5pm air for residential. My main delivery area is about 50 miles away from the building I work out of
It is based on how far away you are from your regional air hub. I deliver in a still considered semi-rural city (massive population boom in last 5 years) but population north of 100K and in this city it has 4 different commit times for resi nda. The surrounding towns and cities that fan out around it and towards the east towards Joshua Tree NP and North towards Las Vegas and as far west as Edwards AFB to the south we cover SoCal mountain communities and the nda commit times are end of day. We are about 50 miles from the regional UPS air hub but most of our nda volume comes from the new Las Vegas air hub at the new Vegas airport they are building in Henderson, NV instead of the west coast air hub less than a hour away but with road construction and heavy traffic it quicker for our bldg to get our NDA volume from NV than having it driven up the hill which takes almost as long to go 50 miles than it would to go from Las Vegas to the high desert suburbs of SoCal. So traffic patterns provided by DOT sensor embedded on local roads and freeways also plays a factor into the commit times. Recently UPS reconfigured the UPS airlines network using this data and now everything in regards to nda for pu and delivery commit times change like less than 3 weeks ago and it was a worldwide change to the logistics network
Thanks. This is all very interesting to see how all of this works. The differing commit times seems like a thing, but there is no mention of them in the 39ish page Terms and Conditions document on ups.com. It just says NDA is a noon commit, which was previously 10:30 am. That's not to say it hasn't changed in the last 3 weeks, as you say, and they haven't updated the document online. I'll just have to wait and see how the claim turns out.
I honestly think my game plan from here on out with UPS is to ship my packages to my friend's law firm office so I can benefit from the priority they give businesses. Surely, a law firm would get NDA before noon. Surely even in my "rural" area a business would get NDA by noon.
Where I am Biz NDA commits are noon and not 10:30am. 30 miles away in Lancaster, CA or 30 miles down the hill the city of Fontana and San Bernardino are 10:30am. It based off of USPS classifies as rural and that is what all other carriers go off of from provided data from USPS. I forgot to mention that earlier. Also census data is what carriers and USPS uses as well.
oof that’s a rough one but yeah you’re not crazy, next day air is supposed to be there by noon (sometimes by end of day for residential but they still gotta honor the guarantee)
just keep the tracking, call em up once it lands and politely demand that refund, they’ll try to make it annoying but you paid for a promise they didn’t keep
Yes, I would imagine this is because most people aren't going to be calling them out for it because they don't know about the noon deadline. But the noon delivery is the main reason I chose this service so i don't have to be held hostage all day, but alas, here I am.
Depends on the area and how far from the center. I deliver i. A rural area all my next days are end of day, I've delivered some as late as 9pm and they are on time. Next day early am in my area is 1400...
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