Jared0×90

Ballenger Motorsports has had a FedEx shipping account for a long time. FedEx service was set up completely in a single 5 minute session with an excellent level of tracking visibility and billing.

Ballenger Motorsports has had a USPS shipping account for a short time. USPS service was set up completely in a single 5 minute session with a mediocre level of tracking visibility and billing.

Ballenger Motorsports has had a UPS shipping account for months. UPS service has, to this day, not been set up to an acceptable level of service in any way. The process has worked something like this so far:

1) Establish account, enter information username password. Account checks my business DNB # and apparently my credit is good. So far so good.
2) Hmm…. I can’t use billing, adiminstration, or quantum view services, I wonder how I set these up. After a brief search and a call, I apparently need to have an account representative do this. I have to wonder why? Why can’t I just set this up as with UPS competitors instantly? Apparently my account reprenstative works 9-5, m-f which is not helping me on a saturday afternoon. Isn’t there someone who can just set this up or some automated system? Apparently not.
3) 1 week later, my account representative finally decides to contact me. I ask to have billing and quantum view setup and to have admin acccess.
4) 2 weeks later, my account representative finally actually sets this up for me. The username and password do not allow me complete access (or so i think). I get my billing pin information in the mail. I finally get emails for my developers key and xml access key (which appear with no key, I actually have to view the source of the message to find the key).
5) I am unable to setup the same username and password for all services. I try lots of combinations and finally get my basic ups.com and billing center to have the same access information. I am unable to get Quantum View working properly at all. I contact my account representative with my problems and ask for a simple setup… really, just please make this all work with my single username and password. Apparently she isn’t able to do very much and I truly fail to understand why these representatives exist as the extent of the support and help I get is a phone number for someone else. Why do I need a person to set this up when an automated system should have done this initially?
6) I contact support and meet a condescending individual who proceeds to tell me that asking for a single simple login to do everything is ludicrous and outside of the “UPS universe of possibility”. It is at this moment that I wish I had a record button on my business phone. I am also subject to a very forceful explanation of what “case sensitive” means. When my issued password fails to work, I am told that I am unable to type. I go through the forgotten password process (despite having the seemingly proper one) which is supposed to email me. After hours, no email. The support individual tells me that it was sent instantly and something is wrong with my computer. Thanks man… it’s not like I can’t test it’s function; I send myself several emails from different accounts successfully while I’m being told my computer is broken.
7) I gather the pieces together and this is what I have figured out so far. First you need to establish a UPS account. Then establish a ups billing account. Then get an account rep to establish a Quantum View admin account (This will only take 6-8 weeks apparently). Once this is done, login with the initial accounts to ups.com and delete your original account. Go to your billing account and alter it to your desired username and password. Login with your Quantum view manage account and establish a new ups.com account with the desired username and password. Create admin access for this account. Now delete your undesireable account name and password.
This system is inherintly flawed, annoying, time consuming and stupid. No one at UPS can do much about it and no one seems to care. I just got bounced from point to point wherein there was supposedly always a problem with some other system. I am frustrated, I have lost time and money because of this ludicrous bloated wad of crap that they call UPS and I STILL don’t have this setup properly.

UPS is the only shipping company with which I have received damaged packages (due to mishandling). UPS also randomly decides to improperly change the size and weight of some of my inbound & outbound packages such that their shipping cost more than doubles. As an example, I purchased a package from Uline that weighed 37 lbs and was 36×31x8 in size. UPS adjusted the pricing for this shipment for a 56×30x8 package which moved it to an oversize class 3 package which changed the calculated shipping weight & cost to 90 lbs and an oversize charge of an additional $40. When I call them to correct this problem, they seem to change without question but really, why should I have to call for an adjustment that they should have never made in the first place?

I would love to stop shipping UPS altogether. Nothing about their system is good but I recognize that some customers will desire this service and I will either offer UPS.com service as an option if requested or leave it as a normal option and put specific text recommending against ups.com. Interestingly, I can see my inbound packages through my bills but with no other method. How is this company in business?

See my geeks links page for a new way to track UPS packages with google maps. There used to be a way to do this with GreaseMonkey but UPS killed it. Now this site does it without having to download greasemonkey. Very cool!

Update 11/25/2006 - IOFAST has been offering this service for quite some now. It is the only one I have seen that is written using Google Maps API v2. Still needs a little work to be solid in IE but Firefox renders it 100% accurately.

So I noticed Cox’s Easypay didn’t show up on my latest checking account statement. Interesting. I go back another month. Nope. Another month. Nope. So I go on line to pay the obvious bills that are waiting. It informs me my account is locked. So I call them and they tell me they have sent me an email informing me that they have been unable to bill me. Gee, what if I don’t use your P.OS. email service? Apparently lifting a finger to contact someone is impossible these days. So I tell the lady I have been locked out of my account and she says she will forward me to tech support. After sitting in a 25 minute wait to hear her 20 seconds of information and resolving nothing she thinks I want to go sit in another call line. So before she is able to forward me I abruptly stop her and inform her that I at a minimum want to get the billing straighted out before I go sit in another 20 minute plus line and then have to come back and sit in this one. We go through the payment system and get the bills paid yadda yadda yadda and she forwards me on to tech support. I inform some hot-shot of the situation and he informs me I can now login to my account. Great. I am on the road at this point on my way home from work so I clearly can’t check it. So I get home and try to login and wow - what do you think? It is the same error message. Sounds like the hot-shot didn’t know what he was talking about. So I call back and sit in another 20 minute wait for someone to answer my call. I get a young sassy girl (and for me at 22 young she must be very young!) who is clearly reading from some sort of automated manual. I wouldn’t be surprised if it is the there automated customer support program on there website she is using. After making tons of completely ignorant and/or meaningless statements like “there is one main computer connected to every router - that is the one you need to shut down”.. Yes because that will affect my cable modem right? Even though neither one is aware of the others existence since they are on a router. Or perhaps because it has some magical weight the other machines on that switch and wireless network don’t have I suppose. Anyhow after debating this point with her I give in and follow her instructions like a zombie for about 20 minutes. Nothing is resolved and at the end of this I now have another account I cannot login to supposedly on there EasyPay system that is registered to a non cox email address because she claims that was the problem. Another one of her brilliant statements. She informs me it is a billing problem and they close at 5:00 EST which is a lie because my initial call to them was well after 5:00. I don’t call her out on it and hang up. I call back cox about an hour later and speak with an admittedly nice lady who listens to me and forwards me to another person who I am on the phone with now. My password is now being reset for the second time today. Whooptie-whoo let’s see how this goes. Nope! No dice surprise surprise! Now I am on hold for a “quick check on the system”. 1 minute passes… Another… And another.. So far this call has just hit the 30 minute mark. OK after 40 minutes on the phone with this guy he realizes nobody knew what they were talking about. He resets my password and unlocks my account. I can now login again. Amazing. Now I can view my EasyPay account which is separate from the view and pay your bill info. Amazing…Simply amazing. Why cant they have one login screen with a SIMPLE easy to follow interface? So 3 hours and 5 levels on competence later ranging from absolutely none to decent I am fine again. Or so it seems. They still can’t find the other account stupid woman #3 had me create. I will have to call back later this week I suppose. Give them “48 hours for it to process in there system” Anyhow there goes a day down the drain.