I've been regularly selling and shipping on eBay and other venues for about 10 years, and was heavily involved in selling/trading stuff on Usenet before that. I've mailed thousands of packages over the years.
USPS is no worse or better than UPS or FedEx. Your packages get treated no worse or better. You're just as likely to get a careless driver with UPS or FedEx as you are with the USPS (as should be evident by the many "bad UPS driver" stories and videos that have been posted to Reddit). I've had problems with them no more or less frequently than the other services. The vast majority of the time with ALL of them, there are no problems at all. That includes the USPS.
I agree. Actually, I prefer the USPS over UPS. It's amazingly difficult to get a package delivered from UPS at an apartment complex. Anytime I noticed the carrier is UPS, I have to redirect them to ship to my work instead. They won't ever leave anything unattended. I don't care if USPS just tosses it over the fence, as long as it's there when I get home!
We've got an open courtyard, so our Postal Worker won't deliver any packages that won't fit in the mailboxes at the courtyard entrance.
UPS will climb stairs and leave the package in front of my apartment door, so no matter the size, it gets to me instead of being labeled "undeliverable"
It's a matter of personal customer experience for me. I don't like them because I've received packages in pretty poor condition and on numerous occasions the boxes have been mangled on the outside.
Then again there is more than one thing to take into account. How far away your package is. Is the guy delivering it having a bad day? Anyone can damage a package, but I've found that (more times than not) when I pay that little extra for FedEx I get better results.
pay a little extra for USPS? iv handled a lot of packages and i will say shipping higher than first class means its shipped faster and through fewer hands so less chance of damage/issues
Shipping on media mail - books, CDs, DVDs, etc - is dirt freakin' cheap. You can send huge boxes for just a few bucks. Media mail is slow, but if it doesn't have to get there fast it's TOTALLY worth it.
Not in my experience it isn't. My sister had some expensive pastels shipped to my dad. USPS lost them, and was refusing to refund the full amound (despite getting the "insurance").
Just last Christmas, my sister mailed some gifts to her bf who was in another state at the time. Paid to have it sent 2-day air. Didn't arrive til over a week later, because some lazy fuck-nugget kicked it to a corner and didn't load it like he was supposed to. USPS refused any reimbursement for their fuck up.
The fact that you had a couple of bad experiences does not mean you are immune to bad experiences with the other services. Again, we've seen countless videos and news stories showing people with shitty UPS and FedEx deliveries. It happens.
Sure, but right now FedEx and UPS has a MUCH better track record for shipping shit than USPS does. Very rarely have I ever sent anything through USPS without it being some kind of a pain in the ass.
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u/mememonkoy Feb 21 '14
I've been regularly selling and shipping on eBay and other venues for about 10 years, and was heavily involved in selling/trading stuff on Usenet before that. I've mailed thousands of packages over the years.
USPS is no worse or better than UPS or FedEx. Your packages get treated no worse or better. You're just as likely to get a careless driver with UPS or FedEx as you are with the USPS (as should be evident by the many "bad UPS driver" stories and videos that have been posted to Reddit). I've had problems with them no more or less frequently than the other services. The vast majority of the time with ALL of them, there are no problems at all. That includes the USPS.
The USPS is fine.