So, I needed to get a document from Dallas to Austin overnight. For whatever reason, I think of FedEx first. Prolly because they built their model on guaranteed overnight service. It is burned into my brain from a child seeing those commercials... "when it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight". Remember that?
Ok, so I goto FedEx/Kinkos in Frisco, TX yesterday at 3:30pm. I put the documents in a FedEx Express envelope and ship it via Priority Overnight. That option is supposed to be delivered by 10:30am next day.
I call my customer in Austin today at noon to see if he got the papers. "Nope". Nope? "Nope". So, I get back to my computer at 2:30 pm and see that it was delivered at 2:21pm. 2:21pm?
So, I call FedEx to find out "wht the delay" and what they are going to charge me. Are you ready for this? Listen up all you courier company owners... Here is what the customer service lady said to me (in a real snobby tone by the way):
FedEx Rep: Everything was delayed at all our hubs last night due to bad weather, so that is why your package was late.
ME: ok, so what are you going to charge me?
FedEx Rep: It is the same charge. There is no discount.
ME: But, my package was not delivered by 10:30. I paid to get it delievered by 10:30. Shouldn't you just charge me for the Standard Overnight?
FedEx Rep: No. It wasn't our fault. It was raining last night. So, everything was delayed.
ME: But, I paid for Priority Overnight and I didn't get Priority Overnight.
FedEx Rep: But, that is not our fault. It was raining.
ME: Right. I get it. I own a courier company myself and I understand how bad weather can slow everything down. But, if my customer requests a one-hour delivery and it takes us 4 hours to make the delivery, we surely wouldn't charge them for the 1-hour.
FedEx Rep: Hmmmm.
ME: So, you're saying that it is the FedEx policy to charge me for a service that you don't provide just because you were delayed by weather.
FedEx Rep: Yes.
ME: That's kind of a ripoff, don't you think? Nevermind, I know you can't answer that. Please tell your boss or manager that I am really upset and that I don't think I should be charged for the Priority Overnight service.
FedEx Rep: ok
click....
ok, you business owners out there. What do you think about this? If you own a delivery service, please comment and let me know what you would do in this situation. Does UPS & Airborne have the same policy? If we did this to our customers in Dallas, we would not last very long. How about you?
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
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5 comments:
I think that once a company gets to a certain size, they have the ticket to make their own rules. Implement a no discount policy and the majority of people, like you, complain however you will probally think of them again the next time you need something delivered. They may lose a small percentage of customers, yet we both know they've run the numbers....how much discounts cost us versus lost customers. It's just bad business and we are powerless to corporate america.
I’ve had many similar situations with FedEx in the UK. They cover quite a lot of our next day deliveries, and a couple of months back they collected 2 rather long items from one of our customers. Nothing wrong with the delivery, all went OK with the delivery, just a small problem when we got their invoice through… The two items, two long poles, which we know there were quite light were put down on the FedEx invoice at 158 kg!!! We had 18 kf on our booking system. We called and explained the fact that FedEx would simply just not carry that weight, nearly 80 kg/item and that it must be human error at the time of booking. Well, 2-3 months later and we still had no luck in claiming the extra charge back. So, there you have it. Wherever you are in the world the lack of common sense is no different…
Yeah, I would like to see that driver picking up your 158kg boxes. lol
What's odd to me is, Fedex being a GLOBAL delivery corp, isnt it always raining somewhere that they are delivering to? It seems like that could be a universal excuse for them. You'd think, again being global, that they would have worked a way around the weather by now, maybe by sending trucks out earlier, or in larger quantity. I am the operations manager for a Courier company out of MI and Ohio, www.reliabledelivery.com and I agree with you, We'd never be able to keep a customer we charged the same way Fedex did in this situation.
mmm forget fedex nothing but trouble
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