Shipping Rates Going Up

[Badger]

I actually never phone in my orders. However, yes: Katy is a supreme enabler, and everything is her fault. ;)

[Heidi Jill]

I really wish there was an option for USPS. I live just NW of Seattle, and I know it would cost a lot less than $10 to send a bag via the postal service, not to mention that I hate to "invite" the UPS driver up to my house - he drives up my one lane road like a bat out of hell!

[Scattered]

I actually never phone in my orders. However, yes: Katy is a supreme enabler, and everything is her fault. ;)

Badger is quite correct. I'd resigned myself to having to make due with an old messenger bag smacking into my crutches when the Synapse was out of stock. Then, lo and behold, Katy emailed me a few days later to say they could get a Synapse to me in reasonable amount of time. So what could I do? I had to order it! Plus a few other things so the Synapse wouldn't be lonely during it's journey to the east coast. Actually, it's a good thing, since the messenger wasn't the safest thing with the crutches, the Synapse feels much more balanced and safer, and the doc keeps extending how long I need to be one the crutches.

[Tlacltme]

I actually never phone in my orders. However, yes: Katy is a supreme enabler, and everything is her fault. ;)

Katy is magic! She pulls hard-to-find TB products out of thin air, with a smile!

And though I was joking earlier about placing an order to save $2.....sigh....just did exactly that! You know the order: a couple of OPs here, a packing cube there....I'm incorrigible!

[malamalama]

Just placed my order as well. Figured I'd do it before solar is gone. I'm sure the new color will be nice, but I like the yellow solar.

Can you offer an option of the USPS flat rate boxes as an alternative for smaller orders

+1 on this. Shipping to Hawaii is expensive enough as is. Usually USPS flat rate is the cheapest shipping method.

[Badger]

Katy is magic! She pulls hard-to-find TB products out of thin air, with a smile!

And though I was joking earlier about placing an order to save $2.....sigh....just did exactly that! You know the order: a couple of OPs here, a packing cube there....I'm incorrigible!

Katy is totally magical. Like a unicorn. Or Magical Trevor. (<--Warning: link leads to something loud, animated, and startling. And on a loop. Warning.)

It's been a little while since I've gotten a big TB box, but I am holding fast, I tell you. I am starting to envision a purchase of epic proportions (part of which will require Katy's help and awesome-magical penmanship) but there are contingencies involved so for now, sitting tight.

[WhiteStar]

$10 is still awesome.

When I had to ship a Synapse back (in order to get one in a diferent color, not because I didn't like it) in its original TB box, it was going to be way more than that. $17 maybe. Which is why I managed to cram it(barely) into one of the flat rate boxes, which was still more than $10.

[Katy]

Hmmm. I never thought of Katy as an enabler. Next time my spouse questions a TB order can I blame it on Katy? :-)

Reason for separation : Katy


;)

[Katy]

Katy is magic! She pulls hard-to-find TB products out of thin air, with a smile!

And though I was joking earlier about placing an order to save $2.....sigh....just did exactly that! You know the order: a couple of OPs here, a packing cube there....I'm incorrigible!

Along with mind reading classes, I've also taken a few introductory magic courses. :)

[lonestar6]

Katy, My job(s) separate us all the time, He always takes me back !

Funny story: Last week I brought my beloved spouse with me on a trip. Formal attire was required one evening so we had a suit carrier which we checked. I had my tristar with everything else we needed in case the suit carrier was lost in transit. On the way home I checked the tristar seeing I was going to have to wait at luggage claim anyway. When the tristar came up the shoot I exclaimed "There's Tom!" and ran off to secure the tristar while my beloved was looking around for a human male. *oops*

[falconea]

The Kickstarter Web update page for the Touchfire mentioned a UPS shipping option called Mail innovations for international deliveries where UPS flies packages overseas using their normal cargo fleet, but they then hand the packages over to the local postal service for final mail delivery. This would appear to alleviate the problem of having to be at a specific location at a particular time to receive the package that Audrey complains of, since you can refer to your normal postal service in case you do not make a direct connection with the carrier.

Looks interesting, but there's no indication of the cost.

Audrey

[Darcy]

Thanks for that link, moriond. We'll ask our UPS rep about Mail Innovations.

Regarding shipping via USPS: we'll look into this again, but unless things have changed significantly since we last shipped via USPS, I can't see us shipping internationally with them again. The reason we don't ship USPS is that, when we used to ship USPS, it was unreliable. Delivery of some packages would be delayed by weeks or the packages would be lost entirely, and because the tracking information from USPS is so poor, we would get continual emails and phone calls from customers who had orders shipped that way asking when their package would arrive, why the tracking information hadn't been updated for days, etc. Sometimes if a package was a week or two late we'd ship a replacement at our cost and then when the original package in fact arrived we'd have to pay return shipping charges and ask customers to make a trip to their post office return the duplicate to us. Also, we have trouble even getting USPS to pick up packages at our factory. Some days (or for several days) they don't pick up at all. We've talked with them about that problem but there doesn't seem to be anything that can be done about it. But maybe things have improved since we had these problems: it's worth checking out for sure!

[falconea]

Thanks for looking into it, Darcy. I suspect your past bad experiences were to do with Surface Mail, a service which is no longer available from USPS.

The postal serice is notoriously poor in some countries (Italy comes to mind in particular) but in Australia it is reasonable. Perhaps limit USPS only to Australia, since Australia is the most expensive destination with UPS?

Audrey

[backpack]

Thanks for that link, moriond. We'll ask our UPS rep about Mail Innovations.

Regarding shipping via USPS: we'll look into this again, but unless things have changed significantly since we last shipped via USPS, I can't see us shipping internationally with them again. The reason we don't ship USPS is that, when we used to ship USPS, it was unreliable. Delivery of some packages would be delayed by weeks or the packages would be lost entirely, and because the tracking information from USPS is so poor, we would get continual emails and phone calls from customers who had orders shipped that way asking when their package would arrive, why the tracking information hadn't been updated for days, etc. Sometimes if a package was a week or two late we'd ship a replacement at our cost and then when the original package in fact arrived we'd have to pay return shipping charges and ask customers to make a trip to their post office return the duplicate to us. Also, we have trouble even getting USPS to pick up packages at our factory. Some days (or for several days) they don't pick up at all. We've talked with them about that problem but there doesn't seem to be anything that can be done about it. But maybe things have improved since we had these problems: it's worth checking out for sure!

I don't know about overseas shipping but, within the U.S, things have gotten worse.

About the time I received my Punch order, in late spring or early summer of 09, I ordered other items in similar colors, unfortunately, the seller only shipped USPS.

While my Tom Bihn Punch order was handed to me by the UPS person, I received the other vendor USPS order with a rip the width of a human hand at the opening, as if somebody had tried to reach out and grab the content.
The content was inside smaller boxes which were too wide and tall to fit into the rip.

All my online orders exclude vendors who ship USPS and are not willing to make any exceptions.

I have heard and read many horror stories of shipments "lost" or damaged by careless USPS practices.


I don't know anything about Mail Innovations and the postal service in Australia.

I just want to caution people that sometimes, "cheap" ends up being very expensive as one could end up out the money and without goods.

[Radio bug]

Thank you for keeping the shipping free to APOs!

Radio bug