This week I have a package that's being sent to my house through UPS. When it was sent, the shipper said, "estimated arrival date Fri 08/12/2011". Thursday morning I went to the UPS site to see where the package was and at 6:30am it was at the local UPS. Seeing that it was already here in town got me thinking that it would be loaded onto a truck and delivered a day earlier than expected. I work nights, and it was close to the time I normally go to sleep so I thought I would go to sleep and the package would be waiting for me when I woke up.  Around 3:30pm I woke up, looked out the door and nothing was there. I didn't really think anything of it at the moment since UPS has been known to deliver to my neighborhood as late as 7pm. Checked their tracking site again and the most recent update said  "8:15 A.M. Destination Scan". If the destination is my house why is it not here. It had an entry for a 6:30am Arrival Scan and for 8:15am Destination Scan. Those seem like 2 names for similar things.     
Digging through the UPS website I find:
Arrival Scan: This scan is an electronic record indicating the shipment has been received at a UPS facility. Shipments may travel through several UPS facilities throughout their journey. The shipment is moving; however, there may be several days between scans if the shipment is going cross-country or moving between countries.  
Destination Scan: This scan is an electronic record indicating the shipment has arrived at the local UPS facility responsible for final delivery.
 
The day went on and around 9pm I'm sitting around waiting for more work to come in and I decide to check the UPS site again. The latest update on their site now shows 10:31 A.M. Package transferred to post office and 1:02 P.M. Received by the local post office. "Why would the post office have my package from UPS??"
Doing more digging on the site I see:
Transferred to Local Post Office for Delivery: As requested by the sender, this shipment has been transferred to the local post office for delivery to the final destination. Allow one to two additional days for delivery. 
 
Why would a company request that the post office deliver a package rather than UPS who were the ones who they trusted the package with up to this point? Why would they want to involve more people and increase the chances of something going wrong? Why wouldn't the sender and UPS want the package arriving a day earlier than expected? It sure would make them both look better to be able to serve customers like that.
 
They had already stated that the estimated arrival date was Friday so it isn't late yet. I'm not angry at anyone involved, just confused.
 
EDIT/UPDATE:
I forgot to say why I dislike receiving packages through the US Post Office. Our mailbox is not in front of our house, it is on the next block over from us. When packages are delivered to us through the Post Office one of two things could happen. 1. Our normal delivery driver drives her car to our house, honks the horn and we run out to pick up the package from her. If we are not home at the time, she leaves a note in the mailbox and we have to pick up the package at the post office the next day. OR 2. We get the guy who is a temp/fill-in driver who puts the package into a plastic shopping bag, ties it to the mailbox and leaves it hanging there at the side of the street waiting for anyone to come by and take it. 
 
Friday came and so did the package. Just as I had feared, it did not get brought to the house, it was left at the mailbox. Although, in a surprise twist it was not in a bag tied to the mailbox. The package was left sitting on top of the mailbox. At least if it were tied to the mailbox then it would take some effort for someone to take it. There it was, a $150 package left out in the open for anyone to take. Luckily nobody did.

I don't really know the answer to this question, however I'd say that the post office deliver packages at more reasonable hours. I know for me, a lot of delivery services start delivering as early at 7am. In fact, I'm ordering pc parts right now and yesterday I had to get up at 8am cause the package was already on its way and it was here at like 8.20am. Same thing today. Maybe dropping it off at the post office means you'll get it delivered at a different time.

I don't like to use them anymore because of an issue I had with them about 6 months back.

So, about 6 months ago (maybe a little linger) I had a package that was to be delivered to my house from UPS. The afternoon it arrived 1 of my dogs was on the porch and is an extremely friendly APBT. When the UPS driver came off the truck he came up to the porch, dropped my package, and said " Those kinds of dogs need to be locked up!". Yes, those were his exact words.

Now, I understand some people are afraid of dogs and respect that there are or maybe a good reason for it. At the same time, being in that field they should either know or be trained to deal with those situations a little more professionally. After his knee jerk reaction I stated that the remark was uncalled for and that it was a very stereotypical statement and he should not pass judgement so quickly as "those types of dogs" are the est likely to bite a person if socialized correctly. He then proceeded to tell me, "I don't give a f****, they bite more than any other dog!"

After that statement I asked him to watch his mouth in front of my 2 year old niece and my 3 month old son and mother and that I don't even speak like that in front of my kids and mom as it is highly rude ad disrespectful, aside from unprofessional and if he did it again i would report him to his superiors. He then replied with "go the fuck ahead." As he was making that last statement he began to RUN to his truck. Wanting to make sure the information all matched I ran to the back of his truck to get the truck number before he left with my 3 months old son in my arms at the time in pouring rain.

Immediately after I got this information I called UPS and got a MAJOR run around. After about a week of this I was finally contacted my an investigation team and found out he completely flipped the story. He told them I made threats and was not afraid to deliver packages. I pleaded my case again and their response as that he had been with the company so long and never had a situation like this arise and has a clean record.

He it is 6 months later and he is still dropping packages off at the post office for them to deliver. The issue with this whole thing is you cannot report a UPS driver or they can retaliate and the company will back them.So, if you want to treat customers like crap, just go to work for UPS. I even paid for overnight shipping on that first package and didn't receive it for 3 days after I was supposed to get it. So even after that, and him dropping it off at the post office, I never even got something as simple as a refund.

I really am no angel but I even had 3 witness's that day along with my neighbor who saw the whole thing. His superior came by a couple days later and talked with my wife and I about it and asked if he could leave packages at the mailbox instead of deliver them to the door and I told him that was ot possible as some of the stuff I get is of high value and electronic and he told me it was that, the post office, or use another postal service. I really couldn't believe it. So I said' I pay for it to be delivered to my door and now you are telling me I can keep paying but the driver is right regardless?" He replied with "Yep, if a driver has a clean complaint record we back him."

The reason I am making this blog is because some business's only use UPS and I have no choice but to have the item shipped through them and it is really disgusting that you have to fear reporting a driver because if you do you may not get your package or will lose money using them.

I have a P.O. Box because people like to play ball, run over mailboxes, and like to steal packages. Only downside about having a P.O. Box is that certain items will not come to a P.O. Box. Larger electronics especially.

UPS and FedEx both use USPS for some deliveries. My company uses FedEx frequently and a lot of the shipments go through the USPS system at some point.

Sometimes.

FedEx, UPS, and other courier companies will contract out to USPS to have them deliver packages for the final step of it's journey because its cheaper for them to do so, and still gets delivered within the stated arrival time.

As for dogs, a dog can be the sweetest person in the world to it's owner, but as a stranger you have absolutely no idea how a dog is going to react to you. I know that USPS employees are instructed to not deliver packages if a dog is loose.

Every time I had a FedEx Smartpost package (where they drop off at usps) My package was either extremely late or lost completly.