Sold a player, figured I would double box, foam pack and stop the thing from moving at all in the pack. Still arrived to the guy broke. I mean seriously, what did UPS do with it? Play football. I had it in the original box, bubble wrap all around it in the original foam holders. Put it inside another box with 2 inch thick foam all around that. The only way for it to get damaged would have been to ignore the fragile - this is the top that I put in at least 100 font letters on the top and drop it on the top. They are paying for it but that isnt the point. It was a top loading player and I think the laser is out of alignment or something. The thing doesnt play anymore. It does power on but gets stuck when it goes to open. It is really depressing and I know for a fact it was functional when it left as I test everything I sell over several hours. If there is an issue I list it, this thing was pristine and in awesome shape. It is now a doorstop. At least they are pay me or the buyer back the money, one of us is getting it.

Does UPS pay whatever you sold it for or how does UPS' insurance work?

That sucks so bad. Yeah, its getting paid for, but there are only so many functioning top loaders left.

Is there a reason you didn't ship via USPS?

well if you didn't refund the buyer i hope they get the money!
USPS will be around double the cost at least.
or you ship it parcel post and have the same issue with no refund
since the box was not damaged in shipping, the post only gives
insurance refund if they did it and the outer box has to show.

UPS is in theory a better shipper then USPS when it comes to heavy stuff, at least for me. It would have cost 80 bucks and had 0 insurance to go USPS and it was 40 with 100 in insurance with UPS. I have had mixed problems with both shippers, just thought it would do better UPS this time. Yeah, the buyer will get his money but as stated, that is not the problem. I am thinking of going only local pickup on the things because no matter how I pack them, and this was bulletproof except for stupidity and it was still destroyed.

How is FedEx as a shipper?

Buddy of mine worked for UPS in the 80's.
He told me not to mark fragile on boxes I might be shipping through them at the time.
Reason being, night loaders would punt boxes clearly marked fragile for sh..ts and giggles....
Hopefully not in common practice since then ......
The guy was not joking when I was told this at the time..........

FYI I have received four players via USPS and everyone of them arrived in full working order, no problems whatsoever........
Sorry for the hassle mikey......

fedex is fine for me with guitars, but again they are not moving electronic devices that are made of plastic and 20+ years old.

Received a recent laserdisc parcel which was double boxed in very sturdy packaging. It was marked fragile.
Something really sharp had been deliberately stuck in the side of the parcel with such force it had burst right through both boxes and wrecked the LD sleeves - massive compression creases like I've never seen before. Another corner of both boxes was totally wiped out - like it had been thrown against a wall and jumped on. Presumably this is one of these night loaders in action?......if so then these companies will soon put themselves out of business. If I worked in a place where this was occurring I would gather photographic evidence of those deliberately damaging parcels and then comfront management so they get sacked. That is what your 'buddy' should have done rather than make light of it. He is just as bad as them if he didn't speak out.

i've never worked at any shipping place but think about it.
they get thousands of packages all day long, they put ALL of them together on the planes or trucks.

what happens when an LD is on an angle in the corner and someone slides a large 50 speaker into said corner.
you get damaged packages.

there are more packages now than ever before, 7 billion people don't forget, and you
will get a higher percentage of damaged parcels.

if 10 years ago you use to get 1 damaged package every 2 years now you get 1 damaged package every 8 months that's what happens.
more people, more packages, more chance of damage.

i received a CD player from fedx, box was perfect with no damage, BUT the CD player won't load.
bought it from a person on the bay, they tested it but now it's done for, and i can't even get it repaired.

tried a Carver person on the net that i found, they won't fix this model.
local repair won't fix any Carver, so i guess it worked out best for me, i received a refund but now have a broken piece.

I'd agree there are more parcels going through the system thanks to all the buying over the internet however there is a vast difference between accidental damage and malicious deliberate damage. There is no excuse for deliberate damage by postal workers - that warrants instant dismissal.

Also you say you get 1 damaged package every 8 months...I wish I was so lucky.
Recently about 25% of what I have been receiving has been damaged and in most cases it has nothing to do with the packaging.
I receive at least 1000 parcels a year so that is a very big hit no matter how you look at it.
It is getting to the stage that if you packed a laserdisc in a metal box it would probably still arrive damaged as someone would deliberately drive over it.

well, i was just giving 1 per 8 months as an example.

personally i received 2 damaged, one broken CD player and one broken LD in the last 30 packages over the last
30 days.
but i think alot has to do with size, i received 2 CDs from the UK from amzon letter mail and not a crack on the case.

but if it were an LD or other fragile item they will put it with the larger boxes not letters and there will be damage.
i think now a days it's more chance than anything else.

I read you laserdisc_fan,
Having a job with UPS at the time was a status one had to really work at.
Very competitive since the pay/benefits was so high end.
My buddy did not last that summer.
He wanted to be a driver but the night schedule and mayhem he experienced totally disenchanted him.
I agree he should have reported this to someone higher up the chain however being an informant can have dangerous results.
It is a moral issue, and one must make that call themselves on an individual basis.
There are many stories of whistleblowers to reflect these consequences.
Taking the high road takes courage and resolve, and being willing to face a great deal of potential wrath.
He did not make light of it when relaying his experience, he was very disturbed by what he witnessed.
Thanks for the thread mikey !!!

ive been working in a warehouse for almost 3 years now, and alot of the packers there don't put fragile stickers on the boxes they pack because they KNOW its an automatic football for the handlers at UPS/fedex/usps dist. centers. Even the drivers who come to our warehouses are bad, ill see them put boxes with arrow stickers upside down all the time. I mentioned it to my boss once and he said "we'll if you really want to you can go put it right side up yourself" Geezz.. But anyway, working at a blu collar job myself im gonna guess that no one at Ups or fedex would wanna rat out someone who was playing football with a box, workers don't rat on each other

It seems that you are damned if you do and damned if you dont. You dont put anything on it and it is dropped. You put something on it and it is dropped. I still have about a 75 percent success rate shipping players and the more they weight the less likely they are going to get to wherever without damage. Which sucks. I mean seriously, I double box them, hold them in foam and they still arrive busted.

i have a 100% loss rate on players.
only ever bought 2 on the internet and both were broken, i had to fix one and get the other repaired.

I have sent 12 now, 9 have arrived fine, 3 have arrived broken. Way to high a rate.

FedEx is the ONLY shipping company that I trust to send such a heavy but fragile item. I have shipped LD players over 10 times via FedEx; every time, it arrived in perfect working order.

TLK

the one i received was fedex, but they didn't put the transit screw in.
so luckly i was able to fix it.

the other was from singapore and was BAD, but i was able to get it fixed and total over price paid and repair
it was still cheaper than buying from Japan.

In the last year i was 1 for 2 from UPS one arrived DOA & the other arrived working both were Pioneer DVLs.