We currently offer a flat rate of $5.95 for UPS Ground and free shipping on orders over $99.

The problem is, I think a lot of people think "flat rates" are overcharged. While customers in California may prefer the Actual UPS Ground rate, customers on the east coast will be charged more then $5.95 to have orders shipped to them. But about 20% of our business is in California.

We would put on the shipping select page "We never overcharge for shipping. Our shipping prices are the actual rates based on your orders weight and destination."

What's your opinion? Should we keep a flat rate or charge the actual shipping?

Kris Anderson
Have you ordered from Supplements101.com yet?

I live in BC, so I wouldnt really want to pay the shipping charges for 10lbs of protein or whatever I got. Keep it flat, for my sake!

(Something Inspirational)!!!

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Would it still be free shipping for orders over $99 if you didn't charge a flat rate?

"Try and fail is the manner of losers. Try and learn is the way of the strong." -- Unknown

[image]http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/8302/opensuse2oi.jpg[/image].

lol... Mike sports the supps101 banner...

Shipping should be like 50 cents for me, I live 45 min from Kris

Please do NOT feed the moderators.

Where I walk I walk alone, where I fight I fight alone. You step into my world you step out a loser, I guarantee it.

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ORIGINAL: MikeOO17

I live in BC, so I wouldnt really want to pay the shipping charges for 10lbs of protein or whatever I got. Keep it flat, for my sake!

Actually, since you're a Canadian you only get one choice for shipping: UPS Standard. It's based on destination and rate and you are only charged the actual shipping. There's no way we could offer a flat rate to Canada. For orders less then 1lb... sometimes shipping is $8... sometimes it's $18. A flat rate to Canada would be something like $15

Kris Anderson
Have you ordered from Supplements101.com yet?

ORIGINAL: slayerboy

Would it still be free shipping for orders over $99 if you didn't charge a flat rate?

Correct. Free shipping would still be the same... the only difference would be the rate charged if the order were less then $99.

Kris Anderson
Have you ordered from Supplements101.com yet?

Personally, I'm not sure I care, but I voted for the flat rate, as it seems like it ought to be better from a nationwide perspective. However, I would like to bring up again how much I would love to see an option to have my orders shipped USPS Priority Mail... For me, Priority Mail works out much better than UPS.

-30-

In six months, what will your t-shirt say?

My training journal: Sweating with the toadies
My scattered thoughts: The Bramble

ORIGINAL: WDNinABQ

Personally, I'm not sure I care, but I voted for the flat rate, as it seems like it ought to be better from a nationwide perspective. However, I would like to bring up again how much I would love to see an option to have my orders shipped USPS Priority Mail... For me, Priority Mail works out much better than UPS.

True... I'd love to use them too because we could offer $3.75 shipping on orders less then a pound. We actually used to do that about 2 years ago. There are a few problems with this though (compared to UPS).

1.) There's no real tracking or insurance. Have you ever tried to get your damaged merchandise replaced or refunded by the post office? I have... and it's not fun nor did they do anything about it. With UPS we can pay to have UPS stop by and inspect the products. UPS then contacts us and we can issue refunds. With USPS, we have to tell the customer to go to their nearest USPS Central Office to get the product checked out. Yea right... like the customer wants to spend the time to do that right?

Also, if you're package is lost in transit the post office does nothing. Their "Insurance" does not cover loss or theft. so if you even try to use their insurance you have to at least show them the product.

2.) Some customers like to get things for free. What I mean is, some people like to lie to their credit card companies and say they never got anything. With USPS Delivery Confirmation, all we can show is: Package Delivered. This doesn't hold up with the credit card companies. They need a signature to prove it was delivered (now you know why some companies require signatures). So if a USPS shipped customer calls their CC company and complains, they get their money refunded and we lose (we lose the money on the product, money we paid for shipping, and a $25 chargeback fee). Most of the times customers actually did get their package... they just didn't know about it. It's either at their apartment office... or a neighbor picked it up. But with USPS we have no way to investigate into this for the customer. If the customer says "I don't have it!" well, we have to issue them a refund. If we don't they'll get their refund anyways plus we'll be charged the $25 fee.

3.) USPS does not offer any sort of return service. With UPS, if we made a mistake with someones order, we can pay to have UPS visit the customers house to pickup the product with no hassle on the customers side. With USPS, we have to tell the customer that they need to go to their post office and return the package to us. We then can't give them a refund until it's been received back at our location.

4.) USPS is a government job. When was the last time you had a problem with the DMV and you told all your friends about how wonderful they were and they took care of the situation right away? I've had nothing but nice things to say about the people I've worked and dealt with at the post office... but they simply aren't as easy to work with as UPS.

5.) Cost. UPS charges $7 a week for daily pickups. USPS charges $15 PER DAY for pickups.

Here's what it comes down to: USPS is cheaper on lite weight orders (less then 1 lb), but neither us nor the customer are happy when something goes wrong. While UPS may have their own problems, they quickly resolve these problems and offer the best service to us and our customers.

Kris Anderson
Have you ordered from Supplements101.com yet?

Awesome post dude!

And other companies do offer USPS but they don't explain it the way you just did. So the customer is always looking for the cheapest route. But the minute they have a problem, they find out why it was so cheap. You get what you pay for. I think UPS (I didn't like them at my old house) is better for both the customer and the business side. While USPS is cheaper, you have no protections and tracking options like you do with UPS. And I personally hate going to the post office where I live. Lines. Sucks.

Thanks for the explanation because I see USPS as an option elsewhere but they (other companies) do not explain it the same way. As a customer, I really had no idea of the major differences either.

Marc C. David
Support DB! Buy your supplements at Supplements101.com

ORIGINAL: mda1125

Awesome post dude!

And other companies do offer USPS but they don't explain it the way you just did. So the customer is always looking for the cheapest route. But the minute they have a problem, they find out why it was so cheap. You get what you pay for. I think UPS (I didn't like them at my old house) is better for both the customer and the business side. While USPS is cheaper, you have no protections and tracking options like you do with UPS. And I personally hate going to the post office where I live. Lines. Sucks.

Thanks for the explanation because I see USPS as an option elsewhere but they (other companies) do not explain it the same way. As a customer, I really had no idea of the major differences either.

Maybe I should include some of that info on our website so customers know?

And I agree... you get what you pay for. It's like auto insurance. Would you rather be insured or uninsured? Well of course uninsured (gotta save some money right?)... until you have an accident!

One nice thing about UPS is if you don't like the driver (or their service), you can call their local office and tell them what you'd like done differently. If you're upset he left your package on the front door when he should have hidden it, call their office. In the future that driver will then put your package where you ask it to be put. For those of you who don't know, UPS drivers have the same route they follow for years. That means 99% of the time your packages will be delivered from the same guy. UPS wants your business so they'll do everything they can to make sure you're happy with their service. Try telling the post the post office you're not happy with their service and want something done differently .

Kris Anderson
Have you ordered from Supplements101.com yet?

One nice thing about UPS is if you don't like the driver (or their service), you can call their local office and tell them what you'd like done differently. If you're upset he left your package on the front door when he should have hidden it, call their office.

Man, from your description, it seems like we have a completely different UPS here in New Mexico than you have.

My most recent trouble with them came when an order shipped a bit late for me, and was scheduled to arrive when I was going to be out of town, so I call up UPS to have them hold the packages for four days until I get back into town (I don't want their bright yellow tags on my door for four days advertising I'm not home). When the lady on the phone picks up, I tell her I want them to hold my package. She asks if they have made a delivery attempt yet, and I tell her no, they won't be here until Monday (it was Saturday), but I won't be available to get the package. She tells me they can't hold the package until they make at least one delivery attempt... WTF? Why not? (I never did get an answer to that one). She keeps telling me that I'll have to call back on Monday, after they make a delivery attempt -- I was too confused at that point to argue, so I agree to call on Monday.

So I wait until Monday, and I check online to see if a delivery attempt has been made, according to their tracking page, one has. So again I call UPS asking to have them hold the package -- again, the lady on the phone asks if a delivery attempt has been made. I tell her that's what the tracking page says (don't they have a computer to look this crap up on their own), and she asks me if they left a note on the door. I tell her that I don't know, because I am 500 miles away from my door and checking is a bit difficult. Apparently having a hard time understanding what "out of town" means, it takes me five minutes to finally get her to understand the situation, and she (somewhat grudgingly) agrees to hold my package. I ask her if they could ask the driver to take the note he left off of the door, and she acts like I asked her if it was possible to shove her head through the telephone... Not wanting to explain again what "out of town" means, and dreading even more what "advertising a vacant house" means, I just gave up and hung up. So Thursday night I get home, expecting to call UPS and tell them to deliver the package the next day, but what do I see? Three bright yellow notices tacked to my door, the third one telling me that they left the package with the neighbors.

And that's just the most recent trouble I've had with UPS. From my end, UPS is the worst shipping company I've ever had to deal with.

I understand your reasons for not offering USPS, and I guess that's just too bad for me. Because it's not just the shipping price -- hell, I'd pay more for Priority Mail shipping. Unlike UPS, I've never had a problem with the USPS, plus they deliver about twice as fast as UPS, they deliver on Saturdays (for no extra charge), and if I'm not home, they put the package in my mail locker so I get the package when I get home, not on the next day.

-30-

In six months, what will your t-shirt say?

My training journal: Sweating with the toadies
My scattered thoughts: The Bramble

I think customers might want to know.. maybe a little ? next to a link that says "Why we use UPS"

Then again..

I guess there's no way a customer could have USPS as an option but somehow sign away rights if something got damaged and they wanted to blame the business. Credit card company would step in and protect the consumer.

Sucks because you can't offer both. Everybody would pick the cheaper alternative and then get pissed when something went wrong and you said they had to deal with the post office.

FexEd! Except it would be like $12 just for a 1 lb or less.

Marc C. David
Support DB! Buy your supplements at Supplements101.com

That's too bad. I've heard of a bunch of horror stories using all the different shipping companies out there... but I can say from experience that USPS is by far the worst.

UPS probably said they could hold it after a first delivery attempt and only after that because the package was already loaded on their truck. That's the only thing I can think of.

I would put the blame not on UPS though, but on the company that shipped your package late (please say not us... please say not us... please say not us ). UPS is not supposed to hold packages until a certain date. In fact... that's a hard thing to do with the amount of packages they receive. Someone from that office would need to personally set that package aside and tell themself that on Thursday they would have to personally load that into the truck going on your route. IMO UPS did their job (although the person you spoke with on the phone didn't sound too great)... but the problem lies with the company that shipped your package late. If it were us and we shipped your order late, I would have refunded all your shipping costs for your trouble.

We may actually offer USPS again in the future. In fact, we currently do offer Parcel and Priority to people in HI, AK, and APO/FPO address' (because UPS Ground won't deliver to those locations). But for the extra costs associate with it and the minimal increase in orders, it's really not cost effective.

Kris Anderson
Have you ordered from Supplements101.com yet?

ORIGINAL: mda1125

I think customers might want to know.. maybe a little ? next to a link that says "Why we use UPS"

Then again..

I guess there's no way a customer could have USPS as an option but somehow sign away rights if something got damaged and they wanted to blame the business. Credit card company would step in and protect the consumer.

Sucks because you can't offer both. Everybody would pick the cheaper alternative and then get pissed when something went wrong and you said they had to deal with the post office.

FexEd! Except it would be like $12 just for a 1 lb or less.

Sign away their rights? Lol... I wish. I'd offer USPS again in a heartbeat if there was some way we could do that... but we can't. Sure, we can post on the website "USPS shipped orders are not guranteed and Supplements 101 can not be held liable for loss or damage." But do customers really read that? No... they do not. If their package is lost they call their CC company and file a chargeback. BANG! Right there we are charged a $25 no matter if we protest the charge or not. The we can fight their claim and show their CC company what our website says. Some CC companies (like Discover card) will say ok, the customer is at fault and we'll give you back the money. But others, like MC and Visa (which account for 85% or so of transactions), say "Too bad, you need to have proof of delivery no matter what your website says."

I actually love FedEx. Their system is setup so their drivers basically own their route. The more business they get the more money they make (as far as I understand). So you'll notice FedEx drivers almost always use your first name when speaking to you, and are always very friendly. I don't mind shipping through them at all... but who wants to pay more then UPS? :)

Kris Anderson
Have you ordered from Supplements101.com yet?

I would pay more to have FedEx over UPS, only because I have dealt a lot with FedEx and can honestly say that I love them. I work at a place that has a UPS Shipcenter. Let me tell you, I know all the shipping companies have problems, but UPS is horrific when you file a claim from the customer side of things. Business side is ok...I guess. But the customer side is just hideous.

"Try and fail is the manner of losers. Try and learn is the way of the strong." -- Unknown

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