We've been getting deliveries lately. Mostly shelving units, unassembled. We'd put one or two together, designate its location and purpose, load it, then go on to the next need. Boxes were getting emptied, broken down or repurposed. Space appeared. It might seem easy to make a master plan and order all in large chunks.Yep, tried that, changed my mind based on what happened with each last shelving delivery. Sometimes we need bigger/wider/stronger, with more or fewer holes in the shelf itself.
I firmly believe I'm done getting more shelves now. They weren't delivered this time. I went to the store to see if they had exactly what I needed to finish up the job.
They did. One unit left, sitting exactly on top of and looking identical with the units having one more shelf in them. I'm glad I spotted it where it wasn't supposed to be. I'd found the shelf tag giving its proper price about three feet away over an empty space, but this sat under a tag with a higher price, suitable of course for the additional shelf in each of those other packs.
I'm hoping not to need that extra shelf. I can't use that extra shelf. I wouldn't be able to see or reach what's on that extra shelf, since the spacer/posts are all the same length. The use it's being put to, all the stuff left after selling off most of my club supplies and finished projects, had better fit on that smaller number of shelves. It will be close. Currently they fit in a tote plus a box formerly housing a gas grill, with scattered units appearing out of other boxes along with other odd places as those get emptied. Fingers crossed! One hope is that some of it will be going away as various gift opportunities arise, since many of you indicated that you actually liked what you got last time around.
It's your fault if you lied!
I didn't go to the store today just because of delivery problems but it helped. I also needed to peruse the garden section for a better sized pot for the plant (which I actually bought after the first pot) which needs repotting, a Pink Princess philodendron. If I treat it right, it will eventually grow into the way-too-much-larger pot I bought before I picked out the plant.
Quit snickering! Like you've never done that! Besides, after reading up on its needs, I needed different soil for it too.
My problem with recent FedEx deliveries is that they do not follow the delivery instructions the company I've been ordering from has on file. To be fair, I can't see those instructions anywhere on the shipping labels, so I don't know if it's a communication issue between the companies or a stupid driver issue. Doesn't seen fair to blame it on stupidity if nothing's there for them to see.
Yesterday, however, I kinda blew my stack at them. Of course it didn't do any good because I didn't know the extent of the issue until after they drove away. I did know it wasn't in the correct place, the one where it's easy for me to bring it inside. What I did find out as I tried to open that door was that they'd tossed the packages down such that one box blocked the door from even opening, and the other boxes jammed that one in (mis)place.
Four packages, multiple long trips, multiple stairs on both ends, each way. The packages could have so easily been stacked a couple feet away from the door so I - or anybody - could have opened the door, stepped one step down, and easily tucked the three smaller ones inside the door. The big one still would have to have been dragged to the east side of the house and up its stairs, but like I said, that might be a communication issue and not a carelessness one, or an I'm-in-too-big-a-hurry-to-bother issue.
The more suspicious side of me noted that it was a late Saturday drop (5:30 PM) in a 4-day holiday weekend, and how the packages landed when tossed may have been a passive-aggressive display. Perhaps not so passive at that. (Note that I always had to go for signatures for deliveries, and made sure to strive for customer satisfaction. FedEx drops and splits.)
I decided somebody at FedEx needed to be communicated with from my end. I gave myself a little time to think about it while grumbling, opening packages, grumbling, checking contents, and of course, grumbling. I realized I couldn't truly ascribe motive to the mess, however likely it seemed. I also might have to simply put out a bigger sign a driver couldn't actually pass and which they couldn't ignore, directing them to the actual drop location. It would have to be waterproof of course, all the rain we've had lately. But their blocking the door? Not tolerable!
(Reminder to self to stress the senior community part of this location, and the extra challenges many of us here face.)
(Pause here to mentally assemble a list of all the things which could possibly happen to turn an annoyance into a tragedy when blocked inside....... Done? OK.)
I googled FedEx to find a way to email them. I decided to simply ask for them to bring to all their drivers' attention that they need to be more careful when piling packages at a door to avoid blocking the door.That seemed to be the one thing that could be addressed for the better. I had gotten my stuff after all, nothing destroyed or lost. And this morning showed that most times I can go ahead to the store myself, find what I need so long as I know it's carried in the store (like these shelves are, when in stock, when properly located), fits in my car, and doesn't come from across the country the way many things I order do, like camera batteries specific to my camera, sent from New York.
Of course, as previously mentioned, it was (now even later) on a Saturday evening in a four day holiday weekend. I was given several options to call different phone numbers for specific problems, none of which were my problem. I wanted to email, send something carefully worded rather than risk losing my temper, something which could be transferred up the chain to the "right" person. I got an apparently untended chat room with formulaic prompts for content, which I was still working on. Once sent, I kept getting formulaic prompts, on repeat, If I already answered a question, it got repeated. I finally decided I could only hope that come Monday, something, somewhere would get through to an actual human who cared. Maybe a memo would go out. Maybe training would improve by a sentence or two.
By the time the last repeat of a prompt came through that I could tolerate, I was fed up. It was some version in business-speak of what-do-you-want? I answered before clicking off: Pretend that somebody read this!
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