It’s actually not. I’ve had experience with pickups in many different locations, and almost no driver scans on pickup if there’s no scan form (which FBA inbound does not provide) because it’s extremely time consuming. At my warehouse, with employees under my control, we do not have the driver scan labels during pickup because we send out 100+ packages in a pickup and it’d be a huge time sink to have them scanned every time. It’s cheaper to just eat the occasional loss than to waste a significant chunk of time every day making sure everything’s scanned.
Those are actually great prices you’re getting. Like they say, you get what you pay for. Personally I would pick cheap and no insurance over expensive with assurances, so I would just let the issue go and continue using them and assume that I’d be responsible for any minor issues going forward.
That’s what I heard as well. So I don’t think the warehouse would be successful asking the UPS driver to scan next times.
That makes sense when shipping to consumers when one loss means one unit is missing. However for my case, the warehouse ships cartons. One carton usually has more than one unit. My missing carton has 75 units. That’s a lot of units to lose.
Thank you for this conclusion. I have the same thought but it helps to have someone who’s more experience like you to confirm
Still, the amount of packages that are lost is usually small. I would say around 1 in 200 - 500 packages is lost by UPS. If getting a better warehouse costs you an extra 2 bucks a box all in, you’re looking at $400 - $1000 in expense to prevent a $300 loss (and even then there’s no guarantee that loss is prevented. Amazon can deny you reimbursement even when you do everything right).
Think of it this way, the majority of big successful companies most often choose to do things cheap rather than good. The reason for that is doing it cheap and eating various losses as a consequence of that often results in more profit than doing things good.
Thanks for the math. It would be great if that’s the only missing carton in that warehouse. Last year they promised me to locate 5 missing cartons (20 units in each carton) in their warehouse. I still haven’t heard anything back from them so far. Cost of doing business, I guess. sigh…
In retail, most theft is internal. If this pattern continues and there is no means of getting compensation, then we would look else where.
By alerting them that you are on top of your inventory … if it is internal, then the message may get around and, if it is internal, may slow future “lost pallets” from happening.
If it is sloppy business, then it will continue.
Agree …
So can you absorb these “losses” into your pricing and move forward to make a profit knowing it is a part of doing business with the structure you currently have?
I would not request the warehouse representative to ask the UPS driver to scan a copy of a label.
It sounds a little on the side of “sketchy”, but I understand it is frustrating to have a box of inventory misplaced and any workaround is worth the thought or idea. I am trying to type without intending to be rude.
Plus, the warehouse rep may just reply saying, “Our driver is not able to scan a label without taking a package in possession.”
And, you should never, purposely, give an empty box to a driver.
Side note: Our daily UPS driver, Tim, does scan each package unless we have 1/2 a pallet or more boxes. If we do, Tim pulls the whole pallet onto his truck without scanning.
How many cartons a year are you shipping out through this warehouse?
You need to look at the % shrink and decide whether it’s worth it or not. Absolute numbers should never matter in these types of decisions. There’s also the consideration of small sample size. There’s tons of people who post on the seller forums complaining Amazon lost their first shipment to FBA so FBA sucks, but that’s just bad luck.
Another thing to consider here is the fact that they’re not insured for the inventory there (not at those prices). If they have a fire or something you’ll be out of luck. You can’t sue a company that’s bankrupt.
Agree, but since I still need to use them, I have to let it go if the UPS employee doesn’t scan the label that I just emailed to the warehouse. My hope was to let him scan, I wait a few weeks, and make a claim from UPS.
It doesn’t sound sketchy when the UPS driver admitted that he picked up the box and lost it. We can start the reimbursement process without the scanning.
Nice. Honestly I have no idea how many boxes that UPS driver pick up at the warehouse everyday. The “not scanning” practice is pretty common
They don’t ship much. Most of my inventory comes straight from China. I think this warehouse ships probably around 100 cases a year. Even though they don’t ship much, they hold a lot of my “dead inventory”, products that no longer sales. I don’t want to throw those dead inventory away and this warehouse is one the cheapest ones that I could find.
Very good point! I’m making plan to bring some inventory back.
I do not like the term bandied around here - “Cost of doing business”, as a catch all of any smallish loss.
To me the cost of doing business is MY STUPIDITY, or my bad luck, not anothers.
Like a broken pipe in ones own warehouse that damages merchandise, or sending unlabeled FBA product to AZ myself.
In this case, your warehouser is responsible - End Statement.
If they did not get the boxes scanned, that is their COST OF DOING BUSINESS. Not yours !
If you allow them a pass, then you will get the “level of service” you desire.
Call management - Agree on a credit for the COGS (including all shipping to you, to them).
And then get down to the nitty gritty on the OTHER product they are researching for you, and what are the limits of their liability and responsibilities, that you should have done prior.
Next time - your loss may well be far larger, and only the mirror will answer as to who is at fault.
edit:
I did not catch the exact timing, but if it has been a short while, the 6th box may arrive, but I would still have a conversation with them in regards to the case that it does not.
I would not mention LEGAL, with them at the outset, and in this case it is not worth it. BUT Small Claims court, you are sure to win, as it is in the Judges opinion who is liable. As well, it would cost a “large” company more to send some employee or lawyer to some minor court for the day.
The thing is that this warehouse seems to be charging below market rates for their services. Seems like those rates do not include the warehouse taking responsibility for their failings. Asking them to do so might result in them asking for more money.
That said, if they’re shipping 100 cartons a year and in the past year they’re responsible for 6 cartons going missing that’s not acceptable.
Reading your past post @GGX on the forum here, I can not imagine in 1,000 years that you would accept this - or really anyone except a gambler.
This time one box, the next time 5 or a pallet?
I fully admit, I have no knowledge as if this is “industry standard”, and all liability rests with the “consignor”.
If that is the case, then the poster could claim on his business insurance - as off premise storage is usually included - but the deductible may prevent.
I certainly accept this, and so does every FBA seller. I’ve had plenty of stuff go missing that should be Amazon’s liability that they refused a reimbursement on.
I also don’t carry insurance on my own inventory in my own warehouse because said insurance is too expensive and the actual risk of a fire or something is fairly low. Nor do I insure packages that are over the $100 default insurance imposed by carriers.
SOP ain’t what it used to be…but This IS The Way that above-board shipping and handling entities have been using all the way back to Ampex’s deployment of “Quadraplex” technology in the last ½-decade of the 1950s (and @ least even two decades prior, for some of them using cruder image-recording technologies).
