USPS can be really good or really bad. My local post office is the issue where I'm at; and, specifically, my hopelessly lazy letter carrier. She's a middle aged woman who isn't very nice and hates her job. Packages are shoved out the window into the ditch by my mailbox (yep!). Calls to the postmaster yield apologies, lots of "Sir, that's unacceptable, I will take care of this immediately!" followed by my next package being found in, you guessed it, the ditch. The most recent time I asked the post-master to come out. She did. She saw the package in the mud, brought it to my door, apologized, and told me; quite frankly, that she's done all she can do. In her words, it's difficult to let a letter carrier go. And so she really can't do anything. So now I simply won't have packages delivered via USPS. The Postmaster is great. It's always TO the post office quickly. The box is never damaged. But it all falls apart when this apparently tenured and apathetic letter carrier gets the package.

I should mention, the throwing the boxes in the ditch is probably "retribution" for being forced to deliver them at all. Several packages were undelivered, with a note in my mailbox saying "Undeliverable, pick up at post office". After a couple of times I asked the lady at the counter; who turned out to be the postmaster, why. She called the letter carrier to ask why it was 'undeliverable'. She explained it wouldn't fit in the truck. It was a small package from Amazon. Most of the packages were small (we're not talking about RC planes here, little things from Amazon mostly). The reality is she just didn't want to deliver it. Further digging revealed she had a habit of not picking up ANY packages, and just bringing them all back to be unloaded and claiming they were undeliverable or nobody answered the door, often without actually attempting the doorbell. It was also uncovered that she marked items "delivered" that weren't, and just left them at the post office (the Postmaster told me all of this). I'm sure she got an earful enough that she's being forced to do her job and deliver the packages, and out of spite (or just sheer laziness), can't be bothered to do more than chuck them out the window.

My letter carrier has gotten quite angry/huffy, even so much as yelling at me (from her window in her little truck thing) for getting so many packages. Saying it makes her route longer and longer the more people get packages. Does she think she's doing some kind service? I paid (or the vendor paid) a shipping charge, and she's paid a salary. In return for payment, the package is delivered. What's the issue here? How am I the bad guy for using YOUR service?

UPS, in my experience, has always been great. The guy who usually delivers is super nice. Always in a hurry, working quickly, but careful with packages.

My most "interesting" shipping experience was a TV. A very large, 70" TV. Shipped via a freight company. Once it "shipped" I had to schedule a delivery date and time. Per the vendors instructions, they were supposed to send a 3 man team. And part of the service paid for was that they would bring the box all the way into my home, into the living room, and remove this TV from the box. I would then mount it on the wall and do all that; but I wouldn't have to lug this very large and very, very heavy box anywhere. Guess what showed up? One very pleasant, and frail, 71 year old man (you can't make this stuff up folks) with an ankle boot. By himself. He apologized up and down and said he argued with his boss, but his boss said "Just use a dolly, you don't need three guys for a TV". We attempted, but couldn't even comfortably get it down off the truck. I invited him inside, got him a glass of tea, and called up a couple of friends. We got it unloaded. I called the freight company and they refunded everything and apologized. Felt bad for the poor guy. But my jaw dropped to the floor when I saw a white haired old man who could barely walk with his ankle in a boot coming up to my door representing the "three man team" I was promised. And, naturally, it was all he and I could do to get it TO the lift on the back of the truck (Yes, liability insurance company for this freight company; your franchisee expected a customer to climb onto your heavy equipment and operate your lift) and then took me and two friends to get it off the ground and into the house.