How do they do it????????????

UPS recently lost a flightcase insured for $7,000 that I shipped two-day air from Florida to NYC for eleven days. A lot of time on the phone revealed that they had failed to segregate the package in Florida as a high-value shipment, and also managed to not segregate it in any of the lost-package sections of their depots. In addition, the supervisor I first dealt with failed to initiate the company's standard lost package procedure, which was responsible for some of the delay. The website scanning information showed that the package was in their 43rd Street facility in Manhattan, but they informed me that the scanning information provided to customers, including arrival scans, is sometimes just projections -- their internal scanning information showed that it never left their air hub in Louisville. My notes show that I ended up speaking with six different people, none of whom was properly trained (I got a different story from every one of them) and each of whom was a dim bulb. I had my reasons for using them for this shipment, but will not do so again -- they were terrible at every step of the way and are clearly a garbage operation.

I think this has nothing to do with politics. It has to do with the following:

1. Incomplete information on billing, invoices - that will in a certain way force customs to search inside the box when in doubt, and I doubt US customs are more carefull than the canadian ones....

2. Improper packaging - have you ever seen the boxes for - let's say, the Sonus Faber Grand Piano? How flimsy can you get ? It may come from Italy alright and may be ok for smooth-sailing transport on a ship, but forget routes and mileage in the truck from the man in brown.

3. I know of many broken speakers, yet the damages on amplifiers are much less frequent.

4. Many employees from UPS and others just don't care, and this has nothing to do with canadian or american differences.

5. International shipping is always more hassle.

Last time I checked, Audiogon is still taking money from canadians and enjoying the business, so as far as I am concerned, it is north american in coverage and member origin and the site is set up for this. I do not take it too well that people will encourage others not to do business in Canada both ways. Whenever I paid out to a US seller, I was glad I did, and so was the seller as he gladly cashed the money order. It's a two way street, at least for most of us I think. If one cannot face the facts or take the slightest chances or risks, there's always your friendly snobby Hi-Fi shop nearby, with insane profit margins. And that's on both sides of the border too.

The same shipping problems could occur if you shipped something over a great distance within the US.

think about it...

My wife works for DHL here in Vancouver B.C., Canada. She deals with Customs Agents every single day, as part of her job description. According to her, Canada Customs are stiffer than U.S. Customs and not necessarily as in regulations, but the officers themselves.(Being at the YVR Airport, she will deal with agents from both borders.)

The problem is generally due to drugs. Canadians ship marijuana to the U.S., Americans will pay for the drugs with other drugs- in this case cocaine.

Expensive items are now generally 'red-flagged' by Customs, as a new trend is appearing: people will go to the extent of paying big money to 'decoy.' It is common for grow op's to be set up in multi-million dollar homes, in exclusive neighbourhoods.

Of course, Customs can go to any extent they want to inspect your package, literally even destroying your goods with out any avenue for you to follow afterwards.

So, if something can contain drugs, they will asume it will.

(By the way- I'll bet this 'Customs' damage generally occurs in B.C. as opposed to else where in Canada. Most drugs cross from our borders......)

Fotis,

At Customs do they match the tape on the box being shipped so that there is no trace back to their inspection???.
There is no way that the speaker I shipped could be damaged like it was without it being removed from the box. But then the box shows no sign of being opened because the tape looks to be uncut and it is the same color as when it was first shipped.

Gary

UPS Oh yes they destroyed a Tice powerblock/titan combo that I purschased from a guy in Hawaii.I am in Toronto,Canada.They were doubleboxed from the UPS store in Hawaii and I paid for all of that extra costs a lot of money.The boxes were fine when I received the units but the units inside were in bad shape.After hundreds of phonecalls and pictures that I send to them finally I received just today a check from them for the damage of only one of the units.They said they are working to cover the damage on the other one also at a later time.Now the damage occured during shipment back in July of 2005.I received a check today like 5-6 months later and still only for the one unit.They are bad.
George