WOW!! UPS ground shipping!!!!

[glassparman]

What the heck man!

I went to UPS to send a small 3 lb package via ground to AR and it cost $38 !!!!


That's crazy!! I used to send a ground package with some ammo for about $18.

What's going on?

 

[462]

What the heck man!

I went to UPS to send a small 3 lb package via ground to AR and it cost $38 !!!!


That's crazy!! I used to send a ground package with some ammo for about $18.

What's going on?

Basic economics: UPS drivers are unionized. They threatened to strike if management didn't meet their demands. The drivers won. Customers lost.

FedEx drivers are not unionized.

Aside: Many days of the week, about 1830, I'm near the local UPS cross-dock. Invariably, there are drivers sitting in their trucks waiting for the 1900 to come round so they can check in and punch the clock. Yep, customers pay for UPS drivers to sit out the clock.

 

[Rick H]

UPS just signed a contract where senior drivers earn $170,000 a year plus benefits. Its pretty hard for me to wrap my head around that one.

 

[Jeff H]

What the heck man!

I went to UPS to send a small 3 lb package via ground to AR and it cost $38 !!!!


That's crazy!! I used to send a ground package with some ammo for about $18.

What's going on?

Here's another shocker - USPS Priority mail Shipping went DOWN!

It still just costs way to much to ship anything. I can't imagine how this is not going to have an impact on the online sopping boom since covid.

 

[JWFilips]

I have always loved USPS Priority shipping when they offered the "Regional Rate" boxes! The Priority Shipping rate was based on zip code The closer to me the cheaper the rate! But they axed that this year which sucks!!! Most of my shipping was east of the Mississippi Which made Priority Mail very cheap! Now it is only Flat Rate Priority Shipping!!! Small box , Medium Box, or Large box
If you ship priority in your own box you are Monetarily screwed!
They do offer ( only at the post office) 1st class parcel service up to 13 oz but anything over and your only choice is only Flat Rate Priority

 

[glassparman]

Well, no more shipping live old ammo. Next time I'll just take them down to inert brass and bullets then I can ship flat rate through USPS.

 

[KeithB]

I ship almost everything we sell using USPS flat rate boxes or via first class mail in my own padded envelopes. Maybe not the cheapest in all cases but so far very reliable.

I hate having to find boxes, letting the PO supply them saves me a lot of time and trouble.

 

[Jeff H]

We're not going to win regardless of the changes they make. I think they will stifle the amount of shipping that is occurring at present and that the big deals they cut with big commercial shippers (like Amazon) is being subsidized by private, occasional shippers, like us.

The part I dislike almost as much as the rates is that tracking for UPS, FedEx and USPS has become pretty much useless and that you pay for priority mail, which is SUPPOSEDLY three-day shipping, but never really is. You don't get any money back when they THIRTY days to ship something within your own state.

I used to refuse to do business with companies who refused to use USPS. Now, UPS, or some other unknown carrier delivers it to your PO, so tracking never happens until it's delivered and you get a boastful e-mail that it's delivered. No way to plan around something arriving you don't want left in the rain (hen they walk past a covered porch to place it in the rain) or something you really don't want sitting out.

 

[Jeff H]

And, yes, I remember when shipping was "six to eight weeks," but we're paying a lot more and there's a LOT more technology involved now, PLUS they CAN do it in that time so past practices (three days) is the new established precedent, which also comes with an implied promise.

 

[RicinYakima]

The cost of diesel in my state is $5.29 a gallon, gasoline $4.99. Figure out where the money is going, it ain't to the drivers!!!!

 

[Petrol & Powder]

I'd be willing to bet that if you examined the cost of operating a single UPS truck for 8 hours the cost of the driver would far exceed the cost of the fuel.
And don't forget, it's more than just wages. It's health insurance, retirement, training costs, and other employee expenses.

But the cost of delivering millions of packages gets spread out over millions of customers. And those costs include some enormous systems. Aircraft, buildings, trucks, packaging handling equipment, computers, maintenance, management, sales, insurance, taxes, and LOTS of employees, etc.

These are not small systems or small businesses. These are worldwide, multi-billion dollar industries.

 

[462]

The cost of diesel in my state is $5.29 a gallon, gasoline $4.99. Figure out where the money is going, it ain't to the drivers!!!!

The price of diesel and gasoline go up and down, but the drivers' pay never goes down and is locked in till they next threaten to strike.

As I've posted before, unions necessarily create inflation, and no differently than the Federal Reserve.

 

[richhodg66]

UPS just signed a contract where senior drivers earn $170,000 a year plus benefits. Its pretty hard for me to wrap my head around that one.

I think I need to jump on that band wagon. I wonder how hard it is to get a job driving for UPS?

 

[Jeff H]

I think I need to jump on that band wagon. I wonder how hard it is to get a job driving for UPS?

Well, many FedEx drivers don't work for FedEx and FedEx will try to shirk responsibility for their actions because they're "contracted drivers." I don't know if UPS does that too, but it would not surprise me if most of their drivers are not union, UPS employees either.

 

[RicinYakima]

I have a friend that works as a UPS driver. He clocks in at 0730, his truck loaded by non-union part time workers. Drives to Costco and fills his truck. Follows his GPS to make deliveries and goes back to the terminal. Makes $27.50 an hour and averages 34 hours a week. He does have fringes. His truck is cleaned and washed by non-union workers. You tell me he is making a killing!

 

[462]

Grabbed via a quick search:
According to UPS, full-time small package delivery drivers receive an average total compensation package of $145,000 per year while long-haul team drivers receive an average total compensation of $172,000 per year. UPS pays $0.95 per mile after four years.

The average hourly wage for full-time package delivery drivers after four years on the job is $42 per hour as per UPS.

State​	Average Annual UPS driver Salary​	Average UPS Hourly Wage​
Washington	$62,505	$30.05

 

[RBHarter]

In the rural west a UPS driver is on the clock by 6:00 for the sort and load , rolls out around 7:00 and if they dont have a local town route may not deliver the first package until after 8:00 . From mid November thru January it's not unusual for them to not make the last drop until after 7:00 pm an hour from the sort .

UPS has 1 truck a day at the plant . Fed Ex has 2-3 vans and a semi truck every day . The FedX guys are looking at a modest retirement after 25 years , fixed routes , paid vacation. I don't know what UPS gets but if it's not close to the same then they have to have the higher pay rates to make it happen.

I had a Union contract job for 22 years. The last 6 years I was taxed for my Cadillac insurance that paid about half of what it had 10 years before and cost me a little over twice as much . Sure I had 5 weeks of paid vacation, but it was all trade offs against the insurance value .

 

[JonB]

We are living in different times, that's for sure.

 

[L Ross]

I dunno, I ain't skeered of the black plague, being sent to a gulag or a concentration camp, I'm not sitting in gas lines, and I am not suffering from a brown out. My belly is full, I still own guns, have powder, primers, and ammo.
The only thing I am running out of is time. It is still cheaper to get something shipped to me than driving there myself to pick it up, so......

 

[Tomme boy]

The last place I worked shipped semi trailers everyday through UPS. We got a very big discount from them. Sending pistols overnight through us was $12.50. Every place that does UPS shipping has their own shipping rates that depend on volume. The terminals are about the most expensive place to ship.

Now almost everything I ship is flat rate boxes but mostly the padded flat rate envelopes. You can fit a lot more in them that the small box at the same rate. I always put everything in the Tyvek bags they have then put that into the padded envelopes. Have not had any problems yet shipping over a couple hundred of them.