UPS contract expires Aug 1. Still time for a settlement.
Past experience says this is the time that workers at the UPS centers in the Chicago area take action to cause pain for UPS and its shippers and customers. Delay, damage and other creative mayhem have occurred in the past, affecting shipments passing through as well as those destined for Chicagoland.
This was approved earlier this week.
The good news is that UPS and the teamsters have 45ish days to hammer things out. Voting to authorize a strike before a contract expires is normal. It does not always indicate a strike will happen on Aug 1 if no contract is reached.
Those days are usually when Teamsters in the Chicago area act to increase the pressure.
Assuming, there is a settlement, we are coming into the period of greatest pain, before the contract expires.
All you partnered SPD FBAers, keep an eye on this…
You can forgive people for getting concerned with headlines like
Definitely. I plan to stock up FBA inventory a week before August 1st if they cannot agree on the contract and strike becomes a possibility.
My plan is to take a vacation, and contemplate retirement, if UPS Strikes.
I hope you have a plan for how you will use your time. Retirement is a full time job.
In the unlikely event that my better half doesn’t devise a robust plan for my time…
I’d like to give fishing, hunting and mowing my lawn forty or sixty hours a week a good go.
No need for forgiveness, I will never fault anyone for being over-prepared or having too many backup plains.
Of the three services that deliver to us, UPS is now our least favorite. Ten years ago, UPS followed the instructions and delivered to the back door (and we had a regular driver), FedEx use to drop and run … Amazon didn’t exist. Now UPS tosses and runs (not even a doorbell ring) and FedEx and Amazon follow the instructions and bring to the backdoor. FedEx even rings the doorbell now. Amazon stands back and takes a picture.
We use to tell and/or select UPS but not any more. The culture changed 3 to 4 years ago. This strike notification is probably a result of the noticeable culture / climate change.
Since we are 100% USPS, the only effect on us would be if USPS volume picked up and slowed them down a little.
For inbound shipments, the only “Partner Carrier” Amazon has ever offered us for less-than-pallet loads is UPS.
If they strike, does Amazon have other “partner carriers”?
This is a good question that hopefully one of our FBA pros can answer. Soon.
Scuttlebutt has it that someone is about to fish, rather than cut bait, before the month is out.
It’s planning to train non-union employees in case driver’s go on strike to make sure deliveries on goods and medications are not impacted. In a statement, the company insists the move is a temporary solution and not an effort to walk away from negotiations or permanently sweep out union workers
I suspect that you have to juxtapose these two points, for clarity. UPS is trying to mitigate damage to the public sphere compassionately but also weaken workers’ power, compared to the damage in 1997, while simultaneously trying to avoid the public’s perception of UPS incompetence, that they can’t get their house in order.
My guess is that most of the public would see air conditioning, observing the MLK holiday, and equivalent hourly pay as pretty basic, reasonable, and inexpensive asks for UPS to accommodate and not understand why there are remaining sticking points.
Ultimately, I think UPS planning ahead will help ease (but not eliminate) the inevitable shipping congestion in the event of a strike.
This^^^ But…
I think it’s more about the loss of $$ when shippers turn to other carriers and trying to avoid as much financial loss as possible.
The Associated Press is reporting
The head of the Teamsters said Sunday that he has asked the White House not to intervene if unionized UPS workers end up going on strike.
I think a strike is probable, despite the projected direct loss of $800M to UPS, from a ten day strike and $7B loss to the US economy.
Not sure that WH intervening or not is relevant at this time, as it only applies if there is a strike, and a “long” one.
From The Guardian article: “Bloomberg [estimated] UPS could lose about $170m a day with the strike, based on its latest revenue reports.”
And if it lasts 15 days like 1997, then that’s $2.5B. 
It would wipe out any pandemic revenue/profit (and goodwill).
UPS has posted record profits over the last two years, with revenue in 2022 reaching $100bn for the first time in the company’s history.