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- - What is wrong with USPS parcel tracking?? (http://hintsforums.macworld.com/showthread.php?t=169671)

Live chat with Macsales sounds more efficient then our guessing:)

Indeed. :-)

I'm in BKK now, so I'll have a go when I get home this afternoon. They operate 24/7 as far as I can see.

What year and manufacturer was your Jeep/Mutt:)

It was a 1963 Kaiser build. That was the year that Kaiser bought Willys Overland and became the Kaiser Jeep Corporation. Fat lot of good that did them, as the US government was busy putting together AM General, who "won" every contract from 1971 onwards. The m151 A2 was built by Ford in 1970 (contract year 1969), but that was the last independent bite of the cherry. You can tell a Ford A2, as the front leading fender edge under the huge turn signal light is flat, whereas the AMGs were contoured with the light body. My A2 was a final contract 1978 build. Utterly off topic. ;-)

Quote:

Originally Posted by anthlover (Post 722534)

Hopefully some day will be able to Teleport things.

At that point we will simply replicate what we want. The theoretical technologies are the same.

Oh dear. Chatted with owc. It seems that number, although alpha-numerically exactly the same format as a tracker, is merely a parcel ID???

15-30 days delivery, they say. Hmmph.

Quote:

Originally Posted by seesolve (Post 722530)

The USPS is not a federal agency. It's a private company.

No. They're an "independent agency of the US government"; not even a contractor. Basically, they are run like a private company in that they mostly generate their own profit, can sue and be sued, etc. However, they're established by the Constitution, receive tax dollars, and take direction from Congress.

Closer to the topic at hand, their five-year plan starting this year includes the Intelligent Mail Barcode that is supposed to enable FedEx / UPS style tracking.

Contrary to what OWC live chat told me, that non-"tracker" did eventually show up online, although it's not showing on ThailandPost yet. The wait continues...

Quote:

Originally Posted by GavinBKK (Post 722479)

Trouble is trev, is that it's not a "bit more" over here. As soon as you put an item in a courier bag (as opposed to an envelope), it becomes a parcel and the price, for instance to the UK from Thailand, goes from (equivalents) $17 to $56! It's a cartel too, so it matters not which bunch of bandits you choose.

That RMA cost me about $6 with "tracking", so I can live with that, otherwise I was up near the territory of buying a new SSD outright.

There are a couple of low-cost international alternatives to USPS, but they have to be offered by the company you are purchasing from, and I don't know if OWC offers these options. If they don't, you could certainly suggest to them that it would be a good thing for them to offer.

From FedEx, there is FIMS: FedEx International Mail Service. From UPS, there is Mail Innovations International.

Both of these use the same basic idea, where UPS or FedEx ship it to your country, but then (when it's cheaper to do so) insert the package into your local mail service for the 'last mile' delivery. (Sometimes it's cheaper for UPS or FedEx to deliver it the last mile, for example if at the same time they already have something going to your address.)

I've seen this cost one tenth as much as FedEx or UPS Express (think for example $6 to ship something FIMS, $60 to ship it FedEx Express). It's tracked while in UPS or FedEx possession, but then untracked when it's inserted into the local mail service. It also takes much longer to get there than UPS or FedEx Express, about the same length of time as if you shipped USPS. It's big advantage is real tracking up to the last mile, and not that thing that USPS pretends is tracking.

Trevor

OWC offered a replacement already, but I opted to wait the extra 2 weeks also suggested, as I don't want to be flagged as a serial non receiver. Had quite an expensive purchase not show up a while back and they replaced that.