The USPS is all shenanigans. I had something shipped to my office and they told me they "couldn't access the building." There's a USPS location inside the building.

Funny thing is ordering out of the USA to Canada is way better with usps because they turn the package over to Canada post, which if anything only charges gst. Everyone else rips you off with huge brokerage fees

Technically you can flag a shipper. After recording delivery drivers stomping across my landscaping and literally throwing packages at my door, I got them to stop using that particular gig economy delivery service for my packages. Getting them to do feels like pulling teeth though. It seems you can't do it for a single incident but interestingly they'll gladly give you the number to the local shipping logistics company, so you can call and yell at them.

Was it lasership? I've had packages never delivered by them. I'm assuming the courier is just stealing them since the package will say "out for delivery" multiple times that day and then never show up. They don't respond to emails or calls so anytime a package is set to come through them, I know that I'm probably not going to get it. Nobody has questioned my reports that the packages aren't getting delivered most of the time. I guess the vendor already knows how much they suck but for some reason is ok with the spillage? Maybe the cost savings for using one of these gig economy delivery services is so cheap that its still worth it after having to replace customer orders that get stolen. Maybe it's like doing business with the mob, there's just a certain amount of money you're going to have to lose due to rampant theft but the money you save by getting around the normal business costs makes it worth it.

Lasership is the worst. Last time they were my carrier, it was marked as delivered with a note it was left on my deck. I don't have a deck.

I had a Lasership package found on the street by a stranger (thankfully he sent it to me with a note).

I got Amazon to avoid shipping things to me using their own execrable AMZL (Amazon Logistics) service, by emailing Jeff Bezos. They said from now on they would only use AMZL if there is no other way to ship (e.g. for same-day shipping). So far this has been a good solution.

Hah, exactly the opposite situation for me with USPS in Brooklyn - they've got a key to my (large) residential building, and are the only carrier who can reliably deliver when my super is busy with something and can't accept a package. I'd opt out of Lasership in a heartbeat if I could, they're wholly useless.

Realistically, I just buy a month of Prime if I know I'm going to be needing lots of things soon (spring cleaning season or whatever), and don't keep an active subscription for the rest of the year. I found myself not using most of the new perks, becoming increasingly skeptical of product authenticity, and not enjoying the prices going up and up every renewal. Its a lot easier to walk over to Target or sit on the train for 15 mins to get to Bed Bath and Beyond / Home Depot than it is to sit around at home all night because Lasership marked my package as "delivered" 6 hours ago but doesn't intend to show up until 10pm.

>It's one of a few things that perplex me about Amazon

Their price match policy is pretty silly too. I bought a robo vacuum that got a $150 off promotion a week later. They were unwilling to refund me the difference but are willing to let me return the old one for a full refund while buying a new one at the discounted price.

That may make sense if the inverse of percentage of people that actually go to the trouble of returning a bulky item multiplied by the margin is higher than the shipping cost of a new item.

It's pretty easy. I've done this with hard drives that I had already installed.

Just printed the return label for the higher priced item, and slapped it on the box and gave it right back to the carrier when he delivered the same, lower priced item.

Yes, but it doesn't matter if you do it, it matters if most people do it. His argument (which I believe) is that notably fewer people will do it if they have to return the item and get a new one.

When those are the only two options presented to them, a lot of people won't be arsed to return the item, which will save Amazon $150.

I once bought a book from them and while it was in shipping, the price dropped due to a sale. I called and asked if they would reduce the price on my book and they said no but they said I could order it again at the new price and and then mail back the previous book once it reaches me.

There is a startup called Paribus that was doing automated claims for Amazon price drops. Amazon locked down the policy after a while.

There's actually several companies offering this service, Earny is another one.

I had the same experience in Brooklyn (Atlantic Ave post office) and didn't think anything was getting sent out for delivery. One day I went to get a package and they said "we don't know where it is, it might be on a truck somewhere."

Same, I encountered that problem maybe a dozen times with the Atlantic Ave post office when I lived around there from 2009-2014. Sad to hear they haven't improved since then, but I guess I shouldn't be surprised!

Ironically, after moving a few miles northwest to the NJ side of the Hudson, my preferred shippers have completely reversed. USPS is by far the best option here, since they have lobby keys to apartment buildings and leave packages with no problems at all. (Even though USPS clearly has lobby keys to deliver non-package mail in Brooklyn too, somehow their package delivery people don't have them?)

Meanwhile, Amazon's contractors have become the worst option for me. Frequently they'll silently leave a package with a neighboring building or business, with no indication whatsoever that they've done so, and with no initial attempt at actually ringing my unit's intercom. Or sometimes they'll call my cell phone, but again without ever trying the intercom first. After a few years of this, I gave up and cancelled Prime.

Unfortunately, in my case, they've switched from being mostly UPS to mostly a combination of USPS and, increasingly, their own trucks. USPS is fine for smaller envelopes and packages and I even bought an extra-large mailbox to accommodate somewhat larger boxes. But USPS hates to come down my driveway (long and rough) so bigger packages often get hung off my mailbox, the mailbox door is left open, or sometimes just sent back to the post office for pickup.

You can search for stuff only sold by Amazon, at least in the UK. You can run a search and then filter the vendor to "Amazon.co.uk" only.

Bad delivery is a huge annoyance over here in The Netherlands too. My experience is that the big webshops (Coolblue, Bol.com) are excellent with their deliveries, but as soon as you order from some of the smaller stores or via the brand-sites, it's a mess. DPD in particular is absolutely atrocious, and that's been my experience in multiple cities in Europe.

The problem seems to be that the local webshops work with the more local delivery services, whereas the brand-site-stores and a bunch of others use delivery services that work across Europe. Those seem to be awful everywhere (the aforementioned DPD, but I've heard similar things about FedEx and DHL).

DPD is the worst. They almost returned my package to the origin because they couldn't call me to deliver once, I asked why couldn't they knock, ring the doorbell or leave a notice and while trying to excuse themselves they accidentally told me the number they tried to call - it was the package shipping number. :facepalm:

I had a similar experience with FedEx until I filed a BBB complaint. That got things sorted out quick.

I am still amazed that people take BBB complaints seriously. It’s just like getting a bad Yelp rewiew.

I think the fact that they're so popular is, ironically, why they're so effective. They're not a government organization, they have no enforcement arm, yet complaints there can and have resulted in satisfaction when other avenues fail.

Yelp, on the other hand, is where "let me speak to your manager"-types go to bitch about restaurants screwing up their orders. BBB complaints seem a bit more fleshed out.

Me too, I don't even know any younger people that know what BBB is.

Bezos has moved on.