Nightmare and torment (waiting game again)

[RogerS]

Ah, bliss. That's what you feel when you hold a new Nokia N810 Internet Tablet in your hands.

And after the long build-up of anticipation, the waiting for stock in the U.S. and for the go-ahead from Nokia (not to mention enduring an unrealized warning about a potential additional 3-week delay before shipping), yesterday afternoon I was able to check online and see that Fedex had delivered my own N810 yesterday afternoon.

At 2:24 p.m. according to the uselessly precise information recorded in the shipping log.

By 7:30 I would be home from Manhattan and experiencing that bliss myself.

But, as it happens, I'm not holding a new N810 in my hands now. Why? Because, despite the statement in the shipping log, a Fedex truck did not pull up in front of our house yesterday with the long-awaited package.

Somewhere in my home town of Montclair, NJ, someone's front door did receive an unanticipated Fedex delivery yesterday afternoon.

Just not my front door.

http://www.internettablettalk.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/delivered_they_say.jpg

Bliss I was expecting, not the nightmare and torment of now-you-see-it-now-you-don't.

I'm just shaking my head at the moment (literally and figuratively), waiting for what comes next. Yes, I see: I get to play an extra round in the waiting game.Read the full article. (http://www.internettablettalk.com/2008/01/29/nightmare-and-torment-waiting-game-again/)

[timsamoff]

ARG!!! I hope they can track it down, Roger.

Actually, the same thing happened with the N810 gift that was sent to me. Thankfully, my neighbor was kind enough to deliver it to my house.

Tim

[sjgadsby]

You'd think a device with a built in GPS wouldn't...ah, nevermind.

[Reggie]

FedEX usually assigns the same person to a particular area. He or she might remember where he/she left the package. A trip to FedEx (the sooner the better) hopefully straighten things out.

[RogerS]

FedEX usually assigns the same person to a particular area. He or she might remember where he/she left the package. A trip to FedEx (the sooner the better) hopefully straighten things out.I'll get on the phone again, and see if I can connect to the local transfer location. The customer service person last night said they would be asking the driver what he remembered about this.

[RogerS]

ARG!!! I hope they can track it down, Roger.

Actually, the same thing happened with the N810 gift that was sent to me. Thankfully, my neighbor was kind enough to deliver it to my house.Yes, I'm hoping it was just a mixup and got delivered to some house nearby with the same number on a different street.

Roger

Hm-m. As that was your second N810, I don't suppose the mental anguish was anywhere near the level of mine. So I will hoard all the sympathy for myself, ok? :-)

[microe]

Oh the irony.

I won't rub it in any more then I have to. But FedEx did correctly deliver mine yesterday. So they are not totally FUBAR'ed.

[gemniii42]

FedEx is breaking down. Just before Christmas I sent a very expensive computer package out. 1 box, ruggedized. Supposed to be delivered by 28 Dec. They misplaced the package. I spent Christmas with thoughts of Cast Away on my mind and Tom Hanks sitting with my equipment in Polynesia. They found it, but their attitude was basically "Well it's the Christmas rush".

[Sentinel1705]

Not just FedEx in NJ either. While I have never gone through the agony of waiting for a N810, I've had my fair share of FedEx either misdelivering something or flat out lying. Either the site said they attempted delivery but no one was home or the business was closed according to their useless shipping log.

I'm not a business, I'm a residence, and I have (had, self-purging and all) video recordings of the days in question which showed no freakin FedEx truck ever came on my property.

[sjgadsby]

Not just FedEx in NJ either. While I have never gone through the agony of waiting for a N810, I've had my fair share of FedEx either misdelivering something or flat out lying.

All the carriers seem to have their fair share of winning employees. For instance, I'm not certain the FedEx driver for my neighborhood even comes to a full stop when making deliveries. Sure, the tracking information shows the package was dropped off at the front door, but we more often find the boxes lying somewhere near the driveway.

Until my wife had a talk with him, our UPS driver would check our front door when making a delivery, and if the door was unlocked, he'd walk in without even knocking to put the package on the coffee table. He meant well, but it alarmed my wife to hear some unknown person walking into the living room while she was upstairs bathing the kids or something.

My favorite though was the USPS guy who delivered the mail our mail when we lived in a ground floor apartment. He'd wave to us as he walked past the big, glass sliding doors at the front of the apartment, and then drop a "Sorry we missed you" card in our mailbox in the hallway. He was too lazy to even ask one of us to walk back to his truck with him to get the package. Instead, we'd have to wait 24 hours and then drive across town to the post office to pick it up.

[Texrat]

Most of my poor experiences have been with UPS, followed by Airborne/DHL. Fed Ex has been very good to me. But the best has been, crazy enough, the US Post Office.

[ldrn]

That *really* sucks. I hope you manage to track it down.

For me, UPS has been the best, especially after I called them and asked them to always require a signature. The U.S. Post Office? It's anyone's guess if I'll get the things they mark as "delivered." I've had several packages they claim they left at my doorstep that I've never gotten.

[timsamoff]

Hm-m. As that was your second N810, I don't suppose the mental anguish was anywhere near the level of mine. So I will hoard all the sympathy for myself, ok? :-)

Actually, I didn't even know what the "gift" was, so really, I had absolutely no mental anguish and, in fact, I was quite gleeful when my neighbor handed me the package.

So... You can have the sympathy, although I wish you didn't have to. Good luck. Keep us updated. If you find out that it's actually lost, PM me.

Tim

[krisse]

My favorite though was the USPS guy who delivered the mail our mail when we lived in a ground floor apartment. He'd wave to us as he walked past the big, glass sliding doors at the front of the apartment, and then drop a "Sorry we missed you" card in our mailbox in the hallway. He was too lazy to even ask one of us to walk back to his truck with him to get the package. Instead, we'd have to wait 24 hours and then drive across town to the post office to pick it up.

Didn't he even TRY to deliver the package?

[luciditydigital]

Aww man I feel for you. I know what you are going through, and it aint pleasant. I'll keep my fingers crossed that you get that lovely bit of gadget in your hands soon.

[morrison]

Things like this shouldn't happen though... I thought UPS and Fedex are supposed to confirm the name of the receiver. Why would they leave the package there makes no sense, unless they asked if that person was OP and they lied. But it sounds like some lazy Fedex worker who probably just left the package without doing a half decent delivery effort.

[YoDude]

From the street there is a sidewalk that separates our gate and then a three step walk up to our front porch. We have no railing on the side of the porch as I installed some additional steps to make it easy on the mailman who can exit stage left to get to the neighbors porch...

A recent delivery from UPS went missing. They claimed it was delivered on a Wednesday and on Friday I still hadn't received it.

Saturday morning I found it under the side of the porch next to the mailman's steps lying it some thick ground cover.

I figure the dude didn't bother opening the gate to climb the front stairs and instead just tossed the small package on the porch from the sidewalk. From there it pro'ly bounced around like a dang pin ball until it fell off into the ivy.

Lazy is as lazy does I guess.

[sjgadsby]

Didn't he even TRY to deliver the package?

Oh, sometimes he'd deliver a package, but often we'd watch him sit in his truck in the parking lot about 35 feet from our sliding door filling out the "missed you" cards before he even entered the building. He couldn't have known who was home and didn't appear to care. That he'd wave to us on the way in to drop one of those cards in our box annoyed us the most.

We did fill out some complaint cards--they were right there at the post office where we had to pick up our packages, after all--but he never changed in the time we lived there. We considered confronting him, but decided he'd probably begin losing our bills or something.

The lady who delivers the mail to our house is much better. She's even come by in her own SUV after work to deliver a package that didn't fit in her little, red mail Jeep.

[RogerS]

Wednesday, Jan 30:

We have the first clue in the case.

Fedex never got back to me (why did I instinctively type 'of course'?), so I called again today. Vanessa, who took the call, said the trace they had done involved querying the driver, who affirmed that he had delivered the package.

Duh. But where had he delivered it?

"To your house, 27 [Ourstreet], Montclair. A white house next to a blue house."

Aha! We don't live next to a blue house!

After promising to send a note to the Fairfield center and let the driver know that we live in a white house between another white house and a yellow one, Vanessa advised me that I'd hear back from them this morning (I'm writing this at 2:30 p.m. and haven't heard anything, but that just about goes without saying).

As it happens, number 23 is a blue house, and so I visited number 21 (no one home and no package lying about the premises) and left a message about the N810.

Perhaps the driver misread the 7 as a 1?

I hope to learn from our neighbors this evening if they took in a package they hadn't realized was misdelivered. With two really young children, they might not have bothered to open an unexpected delivery yet.

Well, at least I can hope.

[Texrat]

I used to work in construction. One day my helper and I were hungry for lunch, and decided to have pizza delivered to the worksite for us and the carpenters. The house was just being framed up and was right on a street corner. No widespread cell phones back then so I drove to the site office, made the call and gave very specific instructions (noting it was a construction site; but they had delivered to us before so no big deal-- right?).

They told us it would be 45 minutes but when nearly an hour had passed I went back and called again. The pizza dispatcher told me the guy was having trouble finding us. Once again I provided very specific instructions, including not just the new address but repeating the appearance of the house under construction.

Another 15 minutes later and I angrily called again. This time they told me the pizza had been delivered 10 minutes ago but that no one would answer the door when the driver knocked. Trying not to explode (or faint from hunger), I told her we had received no such pizza. That there was no door to the house. That we were several starving construction workers that could easily be seen all over an UNFINISHED house.

Several minutes later, a frazzled delivery guy drove up to the house with several COLD pizzas. When I refused to pay, he started ranting. He kept insisting that he had tried to deliver them as we had asked and I had to point out many times that if he had knocked on any doors, he knew darn well it wasn't at our location!

He finally drove off, unpaid and fuming. We ate some very cold and soggy pizza.

Some time later, I found out the true source of the confusion: in their infinite wisdom, the city had somehow assigned the same addresses to two parts of one street-- at opposite ends! The poor guy really had gone to the correct original address, but just neglected to take into account what I had told him (such as the intersecting street).

Oh well. Crap happens! Just hope your situation turns out well, Roger.

[RogerS]

Thursday, Jan 31:

The saga continues.

Fedex delivery was definitely not made to number 21. The other high-likelihood candidates nearby are all the immediate here’s-your-misdirected-package sort. Thus the odds of a nearby misdelivery (the package does have our name and address on it, after all) are rapdily declining.

The street we live on is only one block long, so number confusion is less common than street confusion. We get mail every couple weeks that is meant for 27 Some-Other-Street (of course, that's USPS, not Fedex). If the N810 is going to show up in the next day or so, that's the most likely explanation.

But I'm already bracing myself for the "OK, who's going to accept responsibility for replacing this device" discussion with the shipper and deliverer.

[sjgadsby]

But I'm already bracing myself for the "OK, who's going to accept responsibility for replacing this device" discussion with the shipper and deliverer.

Talk to customer service at the vendor. If FedEx has already done a trace and failed to locate the shipment, the vendor should then claim reimbursement from FedEx for the lost item and send you a new N810.

My wife works for a company that ships exclusively with FedEx, and this sort of thing is routine.

[RogerS]

I'll do that today.

Thanks.

Roger

(Previously I had called Fedex but only emailed LetsTalk. Odd that I was mentally sidestepping a call to them.)

Added later: I've called both companies and the request to LetsTalk has resulted in a "I'll send this to my supervisor, who will call you" response.

Apparently the Fedex driver's flat assertion that he left the package on the front step disinclined the customer service rep to believe my statement that it didn't arrive. Fortunately for me there's that "blue house next door" matter, which seems to support a "he left it somewhere else, not my house" argument.

So far, nothing though.

[RogerS]

Friday, Feb 1

After my third phone call with Fedex, I asked "Are you done? What do I do?" And I got the answer that the shipper should put in for reimbursement.

So yesterday morning, I did call LetsTalk.com, explained the situation to their rep, who said she would check with Fedex and then have a supervisor call me back that morning. (Um, never called, of course. As if I were expecting it.)

And so I called again today, went through exactly the same process, even down to the "I have to get a supervisor to handle this" when I interjected "You know, I've only called you because Fedex said they were done with the trace and I should put in for reimbursement."

That seemed to be just the right thing to say. The LetsTalk rep called Fedex right then and there — conferencing me in — and the apologetic Fedex rep who answered said they would be sending the driver back to leave a note at the house where the delivery was made but that LetsTalk should definitely ship another unit and put in for reimbursement. (Unspoken was the alternate scenario: "And if we find the package, we'll ship it back and settle up again.")

Right outcome. So now I've got a Monday or possibly Tuesday delivery.

I'll wait to celebrate 'til I get the package.

[timsamoff]

Yay!!! :D

Tim

[RogerS]

I now have a second Fedex tracking number (not yet showing anything), an expected delivery of Tuesday afternoon, and a sign for my door to the driver to hand the package to me personally.

No slip-ups this time!

[sjgadsby]

I now have a second Fedex tracking number (not yet showing anything), an expected delivery of Tuesday afternoon, and a sign for my door to the driver to hand the package to me personally.

No slip-ups this time!

So, the rest of your town will awaken tomorrow to find "No, wrong address" signs on their front doors then?

[gerbick]

^ brilliant

[RogerS]

As of 2:55 p.m. today, I am in possession of my discounted-(and-paid-for) N810.

Hoorah!

Thanks to all you wrote to buck up my spirits during my trials.

Roger

[timsamoff]

Good news. Very good news.

Tim

[FGol]

Congratulations on surviving the wait. I am usually too impatient.

Frank

[TA-t3]

Congratulations on surviving the wait. I am usually too impatient.
You mean you die every time? Must be quite an experience! :D