Friday, December 02, 2005

I just got two books from Michael Wiese Productions and was totally boned on the delivery. I had to pay a $34.01 shipping charge on top of the $9.40 shipping charge they quoted me.

This is apparently another case where UPS charged all sorts of customs brokerage fees to ship to Canada. Canada charges a 15% VAT (sales tax) on anything coming in. UPS charges $25 to handle the VAT. Then they charge INTEREST on the VAT paid -- which should be about two cents, but they have a "minimum interest" charge of about $7. Then they tack on a fuel surcharge, etc. It can get up to about $50, even if the VAT itself (the only thing that actually had to be paid out) is two lousy bucks.

Various irresponsible companies, such as apparently Michael Wiese Productions, continue to use UPS even though UPS grossly overcharges their customers. Their attitude apparently is "this is UPS's issue, not ours."

Well, no it's not. Michael Wiese Productions could have used the US Mail. The post office doesn't charge $25 to handle VAT. You just have to go to the post office and pay the VAT itself. Fedex handles customs for free. Only UPS rips off its customers like this.

If you are having anything shipped to Canada, use Fedex or the US Post. Never, ever use UPS. They will rip you off big time.

If it's too late, and you've already ordered, simply refuse the shipment when they ask you to sign for the UPS fee. Then the company will have to eat the shipping fee and refund your money.

Oh and, I recommend you not buy anything from Michael Wiese until they shape up their act.

Tags: shipping; UPS

12:21 PM

1 Comments:

That's a shame -- I can tell you that here in L.A. I continue to seek a mentor and am more than willing to do the work passed to me. I think a lot of people I know would do more than their fair share to make the partnership work.

I have a former teacher I e-mail every few weeks just to touch base, but he's pretty busy, so I don't know that there's much he can do for me now.

If your potential 'mentorees' are dropping the ball, they probably realized that this writing thing is WORK and the rude awakening was just too much for them.

By  Shawna, at 2:20 PM  

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