Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors Just picked up another broken Savage

An other little thing, after you have had a couple claims, you become a suspect in the eyes of the company. With 7 claims we wouldn't make deliveries to your address. We would make you come into the delivery center and verify the condition of the contents. Roy, did all of your damages come UPS, or are you clumping all of the Gorillas in one box?

To say a rifle is not a delicate item? Try the Gateway Computer test and drop it from shoulder high.

Sorry I thought I heard Gary pull up, so I hung up fast.

This is what I don't get. I tell you the rifle rides thousands of miles in the back of a tractor, bouncing around in the middle of a pile, with hundreds of pounds on top.

It gets handled 25 30 times.

You still say it's one guy breaking them.

I tell you it can't be because we have cameras on all belts and and trailers.

And you just fight to stick up for the shipper. No one offered to take me up on sending them 7, 4 foot light bulbs in seven boxes. If one breaks I'll give you choice pick of all my 99's. If they all make it you give me choice pick of your, Joe.

Out of 60 or so that I've had shipped or have shipped out, I've had 3 damaged. Two cracks in the tang, one with a small chunk of wood missing from the tang. A few that survived horrible packing, a few that survived boxes that showed up looked like somebody tried to bend then in half. FedEx is the worst for me.

All I ever bought and had shipped ended up at my local gun dealer packed in a cardboard box, and the rifle and box unscathed. Maybe I'm lucky.

[quote=JoeMartin

You still say it's one guy breaking them.

I did?

And you just fight to stick up for the shipper.

I don't know what that means.

No one offered to take me up on sending them 7, 4 foot light bulbs in seven boxes. If one breaks I'll give you choice pick of all my 99's. If they all make it you give me choice pick of your, Joe.

I could pack something in a bank vault too but I doubt that would resemble the packaging of any guns I buy so I'm not sure what that proves. Joe, since you worked for UPS you're taking this kinda personal. You shouldn't.

[/quote]

If a guy were to break 7 guns (or drills, or axes, or chainsaws, or anything) most people would consider him damn careless or a serial abuser.

Roy, I do feel your pain, and yes I do take it personal. If you saw the crap wrapping people use and we still get it through in one piece, it's unbelievable. If you really thought it was the driver, I'd make a formal complaint. If all of your damaged rifles were UPS, I'd still make a formal complaint. The most likely place for a damage is on the belts. Not the people. We process close to a Quarter million packages in a 3.5 to 4 hour shift, in just one building. If a long package is caught in a turn and it gets wedged in place, it gets a lot of pressure on it. Yes, I go way, way over kill on any package I ship because I've seen the mechanization these pieces go through. But, you don't have to go that far. I'm just telling every one that soft foam and bubble wrap is not enough. A rigid box is needed.

People in this thread that have said, "You make a lot of money, you should take better care of our stuff", are way, way, off base. We do make good money, and destroying a package is a "Cardinal Sin" when it comes to termination. There are camera's every where, there are supervisors every where. Loss Prevention offers a $5,000 reward for ratting out theft and dishonest acts. The vast, vast number of damages are due to poor packing. I've had several people here tell me they received packages with the contents just slid in a box with no packing. You have to tell the people you deal with to do it right. My daughter wants the computer, I have to go, Joe.

I understand the handlers are overworked. They handle too many packages in too short a time, and the belt keeps moving even when you need to scratch your ass. I understand that the weight of a package isn't the #1 criteria used for determining where it's placed in the load, so heavy objects necessarily end up on top of more fragile objects. I hear ya Joe.

BUUUUUUTTTTT, that's not our problem. We pay for handlers to move an item from point A to B, and we expect it to arrived unmangled, which is completely reasonable. The USPS put a forklift thru a Sako for me, then denied the claim. I guess that's my fault?

It's also reasonable for you to be frustrated with the lack of padding and support packages are sent with, but ultimately, those are the conditions of the deal, and UPS has to deal with them, as the contractor hired to perform the job. I am a contractor and I deal with real conditions, as they are, to produce the finished product my customers need. I have problems in my processes if I can't somehow produce the desired results. Anything else is just excuses. I'm hired to solve a problem, not create one.

Making excuses about why it's ok to damage packages or how it happens, "because the handler in the hub only makes $10 an hour and will be gone in two months anyway", is not a healthy outlook. It reveals that someone somewhere has lost sight of the customer.

In a way, it reminds me of my wife's situation. Way too few people performing way too much work. Stress breakdowns, injuries, meltdowns, turnover. This is the Fed. gov BTW. Are the working conditions the clients fault, so we should yell at them when they need help?

Or are working conditions managements fault? (In this case Congress controls the purse strings, so it's a little different than "management", but you get the idea)

I just believe ultimately, that management must find better solutions to prevent this kind of damage, or they need to put the customers first and pay the claims when they occur.

In my experience, neither is happening at the expense to their customers, and they're ok with it.

I'm not.

Just for the record, I stopped by my local gun shop. Gary knows them too. I asked how many rifles he has received from the maker that have been damaged. He laughed and asked why, thought it was a joke. I told him about this thread and that I was serious. Never, not one. He's been in business since the early 70's, and never, not one.He also said he has gotten many that were just placed in a box to rattle around, no packing, and they made it OK. The only rifle he ever shipped that got broken was one going on a hunt, in a good hard case, and was broken by an Airline.

Roy, for the rest of this statement, if I use the term "you", I am not referring to you. I'm referring to every one here in this thread that thinks UPS'ers are jumping on their boxes, slamming them around, breaking them just to hear the glass tinkle. It is a collective you, just as the Gorilla is a collective Gorilla.


Now, you know I'm retired, I no longer work for UPS. BUUUUUT, we are going to have to agree to disagree. Because there is no way in this world UPS or any other shipper is going to check every box to see if some Bozo packed it correct, and if not, repack it for them for free

Now, you also know I'm not calling you names, because you are not the one doing the shipping. You are receiving.

As a shipping company, we expect people to pack shipments in a proper way. If they don't, and they get broken, the claim is not going to be paid. Many items are put in drop boxes and can't be inspected before they get in the system. They may be the soft squishy ones that undermine the middle of your long box.

Now, if you are shipping rifles out in old boxes that have been used several times, with the Sunday funnies wrapped around them, and they are getting damaged, that's a different story. That would make you the problem. Again, that is a collective you, not Roy.

Roy, you need to listen to yourself. Yes I understand that a lot of packages get pushed through a Hub in a few hours to make time commitments. Yes I understand they get handled by many people. Yes I understand they ride in bumpy tractor trailers. Yes I understand they ride up and down chutes, slides, and belts. No, I'm not going to change my shipping standards to meet the conditions I understand. No, it's someone else's job to check my box to see if I did it correct. No, if I didn't do it right, it's someone else's job to redo it for me free.

It is the driver that picks up a package's job to visually inspect the box, and refuse it if it looks suspect. If the driver refuses your box, are you going to tell them it's there job to see to it that it gets delivered any way. I feel like I'm beating my head on a wooden crate. But, if we used wooden crates, we wouldn't be having this discussion, Joe.

Roy, if I had 7 boxes of any kind damaged, I'd be livid. If we put a fork lift, which we don't use on or near packages, through a box, we would pay the claim. With that kind of damage you would never see it. You would be tracking the box, wondering why we didn't deliver it.

Stop grouping all shippers as the "Gorilla's". I can't respond to the others. Our customers are our only asset. We want them to be happy and successful. Our customer service will come out and show the collective "you", business, how to pack any item safely. Or take it to a customer counter, and have them check it. If the collective "you" does it wrong, don't keep doing it wrong.

Please show me where I said I expect someone else to repack my packages for me!

And for the record, I'm not having trouble with guns I shipped.

I just had a reply for all of your questions and I went back a page to make a quote, and it erased everything I printed.

1. I said I was using the term "you" collectively since so may were following this thread, and others are posting reply's.

2. If you are not having problems, then it looks like you're packing you guns well.

3. You are getting busted boxes, so it's the Gorilla's fault, not the shipper. That's why I said you are defending the shipper.

4. The USPS put a fork lift through one. That's one safe UPS Gorilla.

5. My local gun shop said he has received thousands and thousands of guns since he opened shop in the 70's and has never had one single gun from the manufacturer damaged.

6. You've bought at least 6 busted up guns that the Gorilla's went crazy on, because heaven forbid, the shipper didn't do a good job boxing it. Had to be the Gorilla's. Still protecting the shipper.

7. Now You, Roy, said you should be able to expect your goods to make it with out getting mangled, even though you understand the trials and tribulations of the shipping industry. I agree. But, what if you, Roy, hand the driver a piece of crap wrapped package. Because the driver didn't refuse it, does that mean the shipper is stuck with it and has to fix your piece of crap wrapped box or eat the claim?

8. Now, I know you, Roy, would not give the shipper a piece of crap wrapped box. I've seen the work you have done. I know the level of integrity you function at. But, many of the other "you's" out there will wrap a gun in the Sunday Funnies and call it good. I, me, Joe, believe that at least some of the guns you have received damaged were not packed correct, maybe all of them.

9. I have seen boxes fall off belts and bust open, other boxes get caught in jams and crushed, but you as the customer would never see them. They go straight to Overgoods, checked for damage and missing contents. If anything is wrong they get returned to the shipper. If all is good they get rewrapped and forwarded with a note that they had been through our Overgoods and rewrapped.

I know a lot of this is your frustration and venting. It's also become a bit of a game blaming the Gorillas. I'd be frustrated too. But, Me, Joe, would be flipping out on any shipper that did not have some kind of support on both sides of the box, not the arbitrary and fictional Gorilla. If I wanted to ship you a box there are dozens of dumpsters in front of new houses with pieces of plywood or particle board in them for the dumpster diver. We are not talking about new guns from the manufacturer, so that's off topic.

There is absolutely nothing you can do to convince me that you have received 7 perfectly boxed guns that were damaged. I don't believe it. You can get a rifle from Holland and Holland, or Rigby, and I bet they won't show up broken. I will also bet they don't show up in a box with peanuts or bubble wrap. Weather it's an H&H or a Stevens Favorite, if the shipper doesn't have the knowledge or pride to pack it right, all bets are off. The end, I'm done, Joe.

Joe old buddy, you're the best, no hard feelings ever from me.

Thank you Roy, Joe.