Arg!

**sathor** · 1st February 09, 03:16 PM

When I set up shipping rates for my website, I found that USPS always beat UPS in value. I think there might be something for 'discount' rates that perhaps others get, that I do not.

**Jerry** · 2nd February 09, 05:19 AM

Good luck, I've had nothing but problems with DHL, including being told "Sir, your address does not exist". I also learned when I had to go and get my package, "you pay for shipping, not delivery".

**The Barry** · 2nd February 09, 10:04 AM

I think that the easiest solution is the not-quite-invented "kilt and kilt accessory teleportation device".

I'm not that savvy at physics, but I believe that Jerry @ SWK has been perfecting the designs on this for some time.

**Squeaky McMurdo** · 5th February 09, 09:55 AM

My internet has been being weird for the past while so I've been able to read some of this thread but not post.

Firstly, I don't blame Scotweb for DHL's stupidity/dislexia. But, I'm still upset that they sent it DHL in the first place when their website said FedEx.

And I called DHL after my package spent several days in KY. It turns out some well-meaning person "corrected" the label and DHL was trying to send it to Ashton, KY instead of Afton, WY.

They couldn't find my address in KY (duh) so they were preparing to send it BACK to Scotweb.

So I got that cleared up and it finally showed up on the website that my package was in final transit....but remained that way for 2 days. I called again. I was told that DHL doesn't deliver to my area. I asked if the package was still in Idaho Falls because I could pick it up there (it was on the way to the wedding in Montana) but they had turned it over to USPS that morning. This was the 28th...the deadline I had told Scotweb. The wedding wasn't until the 30th but we were supposed to leave on the 28th. Well, we decided to wait until the mail came the next day at 10. It came! Luckily, the people at our post office know who we are otherwise we never would have got it. See, we have a PO box...Scotweb told us they couldn't send anything to PO boxes, so the mailing lable said our physical address.....way down on South Highway 89 10 miles out of town.

I'm in the same situation as Ron is and I agree with what he said. I was worried sick about DHL would leave my kilt on the porch in a blizzard, at the end of my driveway in the snow (its been done before...), or that my 6 involuntarily-inherited dogs would have it torn apart. As soon as it said "Final transit" I spent most of the day watching out the window and playing outside with my (own) two dogs with a baby moniter strapped to my hip.

So yes, we did up up getting the kilts in time for an enjoyable weekend. We just had to leave a day later than expected (in the afternoon with a baby

) the very minute we had them in the car.

**Panache** · 5th February 09, 10:11 AM

I'm glad you got it in the time.

Now don't forget to post pictures of your new purchase

Cheers

Jamie

**O'Callaghan** · 5th February 09, 11:29 PM

Well, do you want DHL with no offices in the US, or FedEx with none outside the US? DHL is the older established company (British, and yes I'm biassed as a Brit), and has locations all over the world, but FedEx was so well established in the US by the time DHL entered the US market that they couldn't break through, and someone in this thread pointed out that they sold out to UPS in the US.

FedEx, OTOH, is a household name in the US, but when they tried to establish offices outside the US they threw in the towel and closed them all down shortly afterwards, no doubt finding DHL as well entrenched everywhere else as they were in the US.

When you send something out of the US by FedEx it passes out of their hands and appears to drop off a cliff when you try to track it beyond the border. DHL, back when they used to have US offices, had a TV advert about delivering a package to Russia that satirised what they supposed might happen if you sent it via the other guys, a thinly veiled comment on FedEx. I think that was before FedEx opened UK offices, although they shut them again so quickly that it is hard to be sure.

Doubtless the reverse may happen when a package is shipped DHL into the US from outside, i.e. who knows who will actually deliver it?

OTOH, it is hard to see how a vendor can even promise to ship FedEx into the US when they have no FedEx office where they are, and they never do. Maybe that is what's going on here. They say FedEx because they think you will know what they mean, and then they ship DHL because their FedEx office closed years ago if they ever had one, after being open only for a few months in the first place? False pretences, to promise something that you already know you can't do, isn't it?

AFAIK, you used to be able to ship either DHL or FedEx going into or out of the US without the package changing hands (although the number of destinations where you could do that was always far fewer with FedEx), but can no longer do any of the above, although one or both of them might try to pretend you can by invoking some other carrier as an affiliate.