“Things always work great. Right up until they don’t.”
An acquaintance of mine is fond of saying that whenever there was a plan for something, but that plan, despite lots of planning, doesn’t go as planned. (A little semantic satiation for you Ted Lasso fans!)
That saying is a cautionary tale that you should always have a backup. Or two. Especially when there are other people involved, and most especially when those other people have an expectation of a good, quality experience, and are counting on you to deliver it for them.
And delivery is a key word in that sentence. Because every day in our lives we count on things being where we want them to be at the time when we want them to be there. According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, the U.S. transportation system moves over $18.7 trillion of freight a year in this country. That’s a lot of stuff.
And we’ve been moving stuff for hundreds of years. Back when I attended Penn State, this process was known as business logistics. It was the study of distribution to optimize the movement of goods and services. And a business logistics degree from PSU was an almost ironclad guarantee of a job upon graduation.
My wife got her business management degree from Penn State and had to take an introductory “B Log” course as part of that program. To this day we have an inside joke whenever we are driving down the highway and see a specific type of tractor-trailer. My wife will look at me and say “piggybacking,” since that’s the one thing she remembers from that B Log course.
Nowadays Penn State calls this major Supply Chain & Information Systems. And according to the U.S. News rankings, it’s one of the highest-ranked majors at Penn State – coming in at No. 8 in the 2026 rankings. As I said, it’s big business!
Early in my career I was introduced to how important supply chain management is to business. During the mid-80’s I was working for a chain of 30-plus retail stores in the Northeast. Due to advances in communication and computers, “just-in-time” inventory had become the “thing” in restocking stores. What that meant is daily shipments of top-selling items was key to keeping sales up and customers happy.
But the company used only one shipping service and that service began experiencing issues as the all-important holiday season approached. From that point on we were no longer a single-use company, and started doing business with a minimum of two shipping companies. The lesson? Always have a backup.
Fast forward to today, and luckily, I don’t have to be concerned with lots of business-level shipping, although there is some. But our choices for sending stuff here and there as individual consumers are limited. Basically, we have three options: UPS, FedEx and the U.S. Postal Service (USPS).
Except, over the last number of years, all three of these options have sometimes come up short for me. In other words, they worked great, right up until they didn’t. And I’m sure you’ve had similar things happen to you.
A quick caveat… with the exception of one specific time mentioned below, these issues where things didn’t work great all occur beyond Happy Valley. My interactions with local staffs have all been very good.
To continue… one service was to deliver an overnight package from here to D.C. for Friday morning delivery – I paid extra for the morning part. They charged a small fortune for this, and then it got caught in their hub in bad weather. Bad weather they knew was coming when they accepted the shipment. The weather cleared and I thought they would deliver on Saturday. They not only didn’t, they sent it to Miami. Then sent it back the next day. Then didn’t deliver on Monday. At which point I redirected the shipment to California because the person was no longer in D.C. And they charged me a small fortune to redirect it. But it took three days to find it. It finally arrived in California over a week late. No apologies and no discount or refund.
The last straw for this service was a recent shipment where I used a box with the exact measurements printed on it, measured it myself anyway to confirm, and then after it was delivered, they charged me an extra $10 because they said it was an inch longer on one side.
A different service once took a box I was having shipped in the reverse direction – from Washington to State College – and sent it west. Where it continued west through several stops until it ended up in Phoenix. Where they lost it, and to this day have never found it.
The last straw for this service was when I went into their store on North Atherton Street with an envelope to be delivered the next day. Their last pickup at the store was at 5 p.m., and I walked in at 4:58 p.m.. The driver was behind the associate entering the items for pickup and I handed the envelope – clearly an overnight envelope — to the associate and asked, “We’re good?” He said yes. If he hadn’t, I would have driven it out to the airport – a 10-minute drive at most – and dropped it off there. The next morning, I was checking the tracking information and saw that it was marked that it had arrived after the 5 p.m. pickup and was still here in State College. So much for accurate answers.
The third service recently accepted two boxes that they just decided not to deliver and sent them back. Even though they not only approved the address, they edited it so it met their qualifications. The delivery person on the receiving end apparently just didn’t want to deal with them, so sent them back with an explanation that there was “No receptacle.” Even though they were boxes (10” x 10” x 12”) that wouldn’t fit in any receptacle to begin with, and were simply supposed to be left on the front porch.
Now, these instances of things not working are just the tip of the iceberg of the experiences I’ve had with these three services over the last decade or so, and I’m sure you’ve experienced them as well. The most disturbing part to me though, is that in each instance, a specific delivery date was promised, yet not even closely met. And their systems know that these delivery dates were not met, yet I’ve never received a single email, letter or phone call apologizing or offering a discount, or gosh forbid, a refund for non-performance.
Years ago I did try calling customer service a few times for these types of issues, but they always fall back on their terms of service. I had one customer service rep who even said, “Well, I sure hope we find it for you!” But again, never an apology, a discount or a refund. None.
Which is why the experience I recently had with Amazon was a little eye-opening.
Let me be clear up front, I am not a fan of Amazon. I try not to order anything from them. If there is something I need but can’t buy locally, I prefer to order directly from the maker of the product I’m buying. As a fallback, I will order from Target’s online system.
One of several reasons I’m not a fan is that any Amazon charges end up on our credit card bill as simply “Amazon,” and when reconciling our statements every month I don’t have any idea what they are for. At least if I order direct from the manufacturer, I have a good chance of remembering what it was we bought. And we don’t order much from Target, so that’s never an issue.
But, every so often I’ll go looking online for something and the only real option is Amazon – or Walmart which I try to avoid even more! This was the case a few weeks ago. And I went ahead and bought it from Amazon.
Except, the product did not need to be shipped by UPS, FedEx or USPS. Apparently, Amazon has a large enough business logistics/supply chain side – I see their tractor trailers and local delivery trucks everywhere these days – that they can now handle shipping in-house for some items. Heck, maybe everything for all I know.
In any case, I received emails immediately telling me when to expect this item, and regular follow-up emails. Except, they weren’t able to deliver on time. To their credit, they sent an email as soon as it was clear the item wouldn’t be here when promised. They also sent emails allowing me to cancel the order. Since time wasn’t of the essence, I waited.
Then the item did arrive. And soon after it arrived I got an email telling me they were giving me a partial refund on my credit card because they didn’t deliver when they said they would.
Let me repeat that. Amazon messed up, and not only did I not have to contact anyone about this issue, they proactively contacted me every step of the way and gave me a credit without me doing a thing.
OK, I’m sold. Things don’t always work right with the only options I currently have; when can I start shipping anything I want by Amazon?!
