What's new
What's new

Shipping companies "New" way of doing business, I call it a scam

laminar-flow

Stainless
Joined
Jan 26, 2003
Location
Pacific Northwest
Last year I shipped a crate of parts to my customer via my freight world. They quoted the price and it was reasonable.

A few days after it was delivered, I received an email saying that was an additional charge, $82.40, because of "limited access delivery". I called the receiving customer and asked what happened and they said that the drop-off was as usual. They were no issues and they were in and out in under 10 min. The delivery was from the local carrier and as they get shipments every week, it was a driver they knew and nothing was unusual or took extra time. We contacted MFW and the rep said to dispute it. I quickly called my credit card company to block MFW but found out they already charged my card for the extra charge. A protest was started and in the end the charge was reversed. That was the last time I received a response from MFW as the rep no longer replied to my emails.

Recently, I talked to someone else who had a similar experience with a different shipping company. Extra charges after delivery.

Anyone else have a similar experience?

So from now on, after a shipping company initially charge my card, I am blocking them.
 
I've had the reclassification rip, they all have sneaky ways of charging you more, and this is not new by any means.
 
I was on the receiving end of that many times pre-recession back in Cal when I played dual kit and had alternators delivered by the pallet. My vendor seemed to keep switching delivery services for the same issues. I would get calls from them asking if what the deliver services claimed was true, it was all just made up crap to tack on extra charges. I suppose they figure a lot of companies don't track the freight charges closely and won't notice.
 
Recently, I talked to someone else who had a similar experience with a different shipping company. Extra charges after delivery.

Anyone else have a similar experience?

All of us do. That's how they operate. It's not just LTL freight - I have to deal with incorrect UPS ground corrections about every second invoice, too.


With LTL, it has gotten better for me now that I have an actual salesman at a decent freight broker - he's sometimes able to go to bat for me on those, and I'm not getting billed for them. The last charge I had for limited access was for a receiving company that is closed on Fridays - the scheduled delivery date was a Thursday, but they didn't deliver on time. Of course, limited access on Friday. Broker took care of that one for me.

Don't even bother with a credit card chargeback. I've lost that one before - the paperwork you agree to when shipping basically allows them to make additional charges, and not be subject to chargebacks.
 
I am just happy 95%+ of what I ship goes in USPS flat rate boxes now and it seems USPS isn't running any slower than anyone else currently. At the start of the pandemic they were atrocious.
 
I had that happen from UPS recently. USPS lost international shipment (again). Resent UPS to replace, cost $55. Some time later got dinged another $30 for "limited access delivery". It was western Australia, so I figured it was just the location.
 
I am just happy 95%+ of what I ship goes in USPS flat rate boxes now and it seems USPS isn't running any slower than anyone else currently. At the start of the pandemic they were atrocious.

Might depend on where you are shipping to, I shipped a package on the 4th from northern Nevada to southern California, on the 9th tracking was marked "arriving late", after numerous calls to usps I gave up hope and shipped another one to customer on the 17th, on the 18th I got a call from Huntington beach PO, they told me that due to "slow down" they had several weeks worth of backed up mail, customer finally got his part on the 19th, with a free one still on the way.

As for freight shippers tacking on charges after delivery, yep, BTDT:angry:.
 
Might depend on where you are shipping to, I shipped a package on the 4th from northern Nevada to southern California, on the 9th tracking was marked "arriving late", after numerous calls to usps I gave up hope and shipped another one to customer on the 17th, on the 18th I got a call from Huntington beach PO, they told me that due to "slow down" they had several weeks worth of backed up mail, customer finally got his part on the 19th, with a free one still on the way.


Concur. I'm having some stuff with USPS get there fine, and others not so much, and it seems to be the same sort facilities that are the hold up each time (Chattanooga, for one - it's 70 miles from here, but it's taking 1 - 2 days over quoted time).

Back during the height of Covid, USPS was a disaster. Close to a month, for many items. These days, just a few days late on everything. I all but stopped using USPS for anything for a couple months.
 
In the last six months, probably 1/3 of our palletized/crated shipments have had additional costs pinned on by the common carriers. Funny how often it's been some "misclassification" or the same "limited access delivery" the OP mentioned...which makes no sense considering that we're filling out the the specs for dims/weight/class ourselves. Occasional mistakes are one thing, but seeing a bunch of shipments where the "errors" go 100% in favor of the shipping companies says these aren't mistakes, they're policy. YRC has been the worst offender, but not the only one.
 
In the last six months, probably 1/3 of our palletized/crated shipments have had additional costs pinned on by the common carriers. Funny how often it's been some "misclassification" or the same "limited access delivery" the OP mentioned...which makes no sense considering that we're filling out the the specs for dims/weight/class ourselves. Occasional mistakes are one thing, but seeing a bunch of shipments where the "errors" go 100% in favor of the shipping companies says these aren't mistakes, they're policy. YRC has been the worst offender, but not the only one.

When we used UPS primarily, they would ding us repeatedly for a not-insignificant fee (like ~30 bucks) for "address correction" and I swear they must have had a shift rotation for the proper way to abbreviate/capitalize things like "BLVD" so they can keep ringing it up.
 
We have very little problems with UPS or USPS for packages. Fedex, different story. Latest is Wednesday they said they delivered at 1:47pm. Bullshit!! I was working right inside the doorway all afternoon. Neighbor called about an hour ago. Says there is a big package by her gate that is too heavy to pick up addressed to us. How the fuck do you mix up 525 and 736?????
 
If there is a business that needs to be disrupted it's definitely truck freight shipping.

I've been screwed out of $ on many freight shipments over the years with no recourse. Luckily Freightquote/ C.H. Robinson say I owe them over $600 in overcharges. Lucky because they don't have my Credit card and won't get another dime from me.

I guess finding the best broker and hoping for the best is the only way to do it currently.

Some other options depending on your needs:

Fastenal does their own logistics store to store and does a good job for things not time sensitive.

Fedex has a freightbox program with no classifications and a flat rate.

Uship now has a LTL freight component on their site. I've never used it.

Apparently Uber is getting into truck freight shipping...maybe this is the start of the disruption.
 
If

Fedex has a freightbox program with no classifications and a flat rate.

I made that mistake once. Turns out, the 'fuel surcharge' ia an additional 25% ish of the quoted cost. I asked a Freightbox rep ahead of time what the surcharge was, and all I got was 'not much.'
 
How do the big companies handle this ?

Or are they so big, no one is watching the charges ?

good question, probably are getting bent over. Its all on account and they're hardly getting three quotes for everything. The ecommerce models (big high volume customers) pummel the margins out of the business so I guess looking to make it up from the cheap seats.
 
We have very little problems with UPS or USPS for packages. Fedex, different story. Latest is Wednesday they said they delivered at 1:47pm. Bullshit!! I was working right inside the doorway all afternoon. Neighbor called about an hour ago. Says there is a big package by her gate that is too heavy to pick up addressed to us. How the fuck do you mix up 525 and 736?????

I think who works best varies by region, here for me UPS is the one I hate. During inclement weather they either deliver a day or two late or in the case of roads that will take days to be snow free they leave the packages at any old post office on their route, sometimes causing a week delay. What stops brown around here has a low threshold, like 2" of snow or a creek that over flows and leaves 4" water running across the road. USPS and Fedex keep running when UPS stops deliveries here.
 
Shipping companies "New" way of doing business, I call it a scam

We use Old Dominion for freight shipments, and although they have been very reliable, about every other invoice has some kind of “crap” tacked on to increase the price.

“Deficit weight” is a common one, and I reckon that means the pallet was not as heavy as we stated on the paperwork. So they charge extra...

“Delivery to mines and quarries” is another one, just because the shipment went to a mining companies’ warehouse — which is located right off a main road.

I reckon YRC is struggling so bad they Feds had to invest to keep them afloat recently. I guess allowing the trucking giants Yellow Freight and Roadway to merge didn’t work out too good, eh?

Price wars have damaged the freight trucking industry, so maybe we’ve just been spoiled on what it costs to actually ship via motor freight?

And as far as the USPS goes, its easy to understand why they’re struggling with operations and finances: the contracts they have with Amazon to deliver millions of packages a week at a loss isn’t working out too well.

Like the old saying goes, it doesn’t matter how many truckloads of watermelons you sell, if you’re “only losing” 50 cents per melon, sooner or later your business model will go bust.

ToolCat
 
All educational institutions and museums are "Limited Access" they say. Not in the original quote. Went from $250 quoted to $750 after the delivery.
 
Had similar recently. Carrier tried telling me that we were not available during normal business hours to unload so I was getting a redelivery charge. I told them Thing was truck never showed up... We run 20 hrs a day and are in the emergent work business. We don't turn away any trucks no matter what time of day.
 








 
Back
Top