USPS

[jaydekay]

I agree with a lot of replies here.

As customers, we should be able to choose cheaper shipping if we would like to.

Paying $10 for shipping on a item that costs a fraction of that isn't cool.

[tab]

Mike. I appreciate your candor (and patience) in addressing this issue multiple times in various threads over the last few months. You make a compelling business case for why Adafruit has dropped USPS as a delivery vendor. I would like to make the economic case for the customer and suggest a solution that might satisfy everyone. From an earlier thread, I believe that you quoted a 2% failure rate for USPS shipments. For me, the average difference between UPS ground and USPS is about $7.50-$8.00 per order. So, I’m paying almost $400 in extra shipping charges to protect against the loss of one package out of 50. Considering that my average purchase is about $30, that’s a huge “tax”. How’s this for a compromise? Adafruit could return the option for USPS shipping but insist that the customer, when choosing USPS, waive the expectation that Adafruit will replace any missing order. This would absolve Adafruit of most of the cost of keeping USPS as a shipping option and provide the customer with what would usually be a “no-brainer” decision. If you want the comfort of knowing that Adafruit will replace a missing order or if USPS is not a viable option where you are located, you can choose UPS. If like me, where USPS is not only cheaper but also more reliable, you can make that decision knowing that even in the worst case, you still saved over $300.

[additional001]

Mike. This would absolve Adafruit of most of the cost of keeping USPS as a shipping option and provide the customer with what would usually be a “no-brainer” decision. If you want the comfort of knowing that Adafruit will replace a missing order or if USPS is not a viable option where you are located, you can choose UPS. If like me, where USPS is not only cheaper but also more reliable, you can make that decision knowing that even in the worst case, you still saved over $300.

Given that Adafruit Indrustries uses Amazon, Paypal, and Google as check out options; almost all of these have there own form of buyer protection and I'm almost positive they would not allow such a policy. Plus such a policy known or other wise is a bad idea.

The bottom line is this. They (Adafruit) don't care that a few customers are unhappy about not having a USPS shipping option. Why? Because as Mike has already said... the numbers for them don't make it worth there time. He's also clearly stated that untill the numbers DO impact them... Fuggeda bout it!

Plus I think they kinda feel like if you want it bad enough... you eat the charge.. if not they can afford to wait around for you (or others) to save up enough to make it worth your time.

It doesn't always worth though... right now I have over 700$ worth of stuff on my wish list. Why because its added up over time... and whenever I got to check out and then I get to shipping and I say... let me go look at newark. And yes I have ordered from newark because the shipping for them was half of what it would have been here.

The fact is they are not going to change... short of a petition showing them... hey you are loosing money & ticking off a significant part of the customer base.

[jaydekay]

The bottom line is this. They (Adafruit) don't care that a few customers are unhappy about not having a USPS shipping option. Why? Because as Mike has already said... the numbers for them don't make it worth there time. He's also clearly stated that untill the numbers DO impact them... Fuggeda bout it!

They also indicated that as people voice their preferences more, they may reconsider. And they should. Clearly there are quite a few people prefer the option.

USPS is reliable where I am, as with many others. Add a note at checkout that UPS is recommended. Even show an alert for USPS if you'd like.

Adafruit, we want to give you our business and many still will, but the cost to ship a tiny part through UPS is *way* too high.

Checking out is a buzzkill, which takes away from the overall experience.

[adafruit_support_mike]

Let me break this down in terms of a game theory decision matrix..

We can model this issue as a system with two players (Customer and Adafruit), two states (USPS and noUSPS), and two probability distributions of a successful transaction per state (USPS=98% success/2% fail ; no-USPS=99.8% success/0.2% fail). Setting the number of transactions at 1000 per day and setting the shipping costs at USPS=7 and noUSPS=15, the cost and payout table rolls out as follows:

[ Customer & USPS & 98% success ] pay 7 and receive goods in the expected time

[ Customer & USPS & 2% fail ] pay 7, don't receive goods, complain, Adafruit makes good, receive goods at no additional cost later than expected

[ Customer & noUSPS & 98.8% success ] pay 15 and receive goods in the expected time

[ Customer & noUSPS & 0.2% fail ] pay 15, don't receive goods, complain, Adafruit makes good, receive goods at no additional cost later than expected

If you compare the success and fail cases for that set, every USPS case produces better results for Customer than the corresponding noUSPS case. That produces what game theorists call a 'dominant strategy': one that a rational player seeking to optimize their own payout can choose every time.

Dominant and rational don't automatically mean 'good'. The prisoner's dilemma and the tragedy of the commons are both games with dominant strategies.

The Adafruit side of the matrix roll out like so:

[ Adafruit & USPS & 98% success ] normal business, receive nothing for shipping

[ Adafruit & USPS & 2% fail ] 20 complaints per day, many in the forums, most of which take 2-3 days to handle. Pay at least 1 full-time salary for time spent handling USPS complaints, pay 7 for re-shipping plus the cost of goods for each order confirmed lost or stolen.

[ Adafruit & noUSPS & 98.8% success ] normal business, receive nothing for shipping. 2-3 complaints per week in the forum. Every week or so Mike writes a post.

[ Adafruit & noUSPS & 0.2% fail ] 2 complaints per day, most of which take less than 1 hour to handle. No additional staff necessary, re-shipping plus cost of goods for orders confirmed lost or stolen paid by shipper.

Adafruit has a dominant strategy that pays in terms of several different metrics.

In increasing order of importance, they are:

Financially, noUSPS is a *lot* less expensive.

In terms of customer service it means 18 less people with a solid reason to be mad per day, and the majority of UPS failures are in the "took 4 days instead of 3" category. The complaints in these threads don't begin to match the ones generated by USPS losses numerically or in terms of intensity.

Internally, it's a statement of what we believe. Adafruit is what happens when you get a collection of damn good people using their skills and intelligence to make something they believe in work better every day. If we're going to pay a salary, it won't be to corrode someone's soul slogging through bureaucracy and absorbing hostility from 6500-ish angry people per year. If we can't use someone's time better than that, we're doing it wrong.


For people who want a USPS option, we have distributors all over the place, including our recent partnership with Digikey. If they don't already have something in our catalog sitting on their shelves, they'll order it from us and will ship it to you by whatever means you prefer. If the difference in shipping costs is a significant factor in your purchase decision, take your business to them. Please.

[Funman1]

Just a quick question, why do you guys never bring up Insurance?
When USPS losses my packages I ship, I file a claim and get a refund of the items I shipped, PLUS shipping.

I noticed that when I checkout with USPS here, you guys do charge me for the extra insurance.
Not trying to add fuel to this fire, but just a legit observation and question....

[additional001]

The bottom line is this. They (Adafruit) don't care that a few customers are unhappy about not having a USPS shipping option. Why? Because as Mike has already said... the numbers for them don't make it worth there time. He's also clearly stated that untill the numbers DO impact them... Fuggeda bout it!

They also indicated that as people voice their preferences more, they may reconsider. And they should. Clearly there are quite a few people prefer the option.

Like I said... you would need a petition. They are already frustrated about people "complaining" on the forums about USPS shipping here. This is probably the least likely medium to get it reinstated from.

USPS is reliable where I am, as with many others. Add a note at checkout that UPS is recommended. Even show an alert for USPS if you'd like.

Dito. Priority Mail has been reliable for decades in my state and I have lived all over the place. I have used it both for auctions and is a prefered shipping options when I can get it from vendors.

Adafruit, we want to give you our business and many still will, but the cost to ship a tiny part through UPS is *way* too high.

Uh no I won't. Like I said I have like 700+$ worth of stuff in my wish list now... whenver I go select a few items for some projects I would like to do... then see the shipping... it's a instant no way. Like I made the case before USPS Flat Rate Priority Mail is the BEST option for buying a few small items and getting them fast. They don't see it that way. Shipping is not a "tiny part," it can make or break a business.

Checking out is a buzzkill, which takes away from the overall experience.

The experience being a sale for them.

[jaydekay]

Let me break this down in terms of a game theory decision matrix..

Let me break this down in terms of customer service and overall experience... :)

Buyers want the option. Not white papers and figures telling us why it's challenging on your end, the company, who is making money from our purchases along the way anyways.

The internal business challenges are essentially being offloaded to buyers in the form of higher shipping charges.

If you're not going to offer it, so be it, but clearly there are quite a few people who are asking for it and for good reason.

[additional001]

I read all of what you said Mike but all I still see is this. It doesn't put a Raspberry Pi Cobbler in my hand for less than 20$.
Step away from the situation here Mike. As a customer and not an employee. Would you pay 13+ dollars to get a 7$ item that weighs a fraction of a pound in 7-10 business days?

Or would you rather pay about 8-10$ for an item that is 7$ and weighs a fraction of a pound and get it in 2-3 days?

Again as strictly as a consumer and not knowing the logistics side. Which would you prefer?

ada snafu.png (108.4 KiB) Viewed 928 times

Internally, it's a statement of what we believe. Adafruit is what happens when you get a collection of damn good people using their skills and intelligence to make something they believe in work better every day. If we're going to pay a salary, it won't be to corrode someone's soul slogging through bureaucracy and absorbing hostility from 6500-ish angry people per year. If we can't use someone's time better than that, we're doing it wrong.

No one is questioning Adafruits quality. It's a testimate to Adafruit that we want to order your products. It's also a testimate to the customers you have that we don't want to get reamed by UPS in the process on small orders.

For people who want a USPS option, we have distributors all over the place, including our recent partnership with Digikey. If they don't already have something in our catalog sitting on their shelves, they'll order it from us and will ship it to you by whatever means you prefer. If the difference in shipping costs is a significant factor in your purchase decision, take your business to them. Please.

Is there a list of these distributors? I would love to check them out!

[Franklin97355]

Is there a list of these distributors? I would love to check them out!

https://www.adafruit.com/distributors/

[additional001]

Thanks Franklin, I am continueing to try to find a Pi B+ Cobbler amongst those with no luck so far.

I did come across this though. Even though this is not related to USPS I do believe the intended subject matter of this whole thread is a lower cost soloution for everyone as well as not pigeon-holeing everyone into using UPS.

So far the only argument I have seen here is that USPS is not reliable enough for you guys? What about FedEx? Normally I don't like FedEx. I have always thought of them as more expensive than UPS. I may have to change my mind though...

https://www.fedex.com/us/onerate/
https://images.fedex.com/images/us/oner ... PDF_v6.pdf

These are flat rate and that start as low as $7.50 with 15 different sizes to choose from. You could have all the tracking capability of a UPS shipment with the lower flat rate price that is competitive to what we are asking for in USPS pricing. I'd wager that insurance is even a possibility?

Will Adafruit take a look at this and at least consider the possibility of using FedEx?

[adafruit_support_bill]

Thanks you for the suggestion. We are always evaluating options and looking for the best way to serve the most customers.

[additional001]

Thanks you for the suggestion. We are always evaluating options and looking for the best way to serve the most customers.

Anytime Bill. This is a pretty important issue to me so I really want to help out anyway I can.

Also shouting out to the community out there... I found an authorized distributor of Adafruit that has some of the stuff I was looking for and they have USPS First Class and Priority Mail shipping. First Class was $2.99 but I opted for Priority for $5.25 If anyone else finds other distributors that do the same please post up, Thanks! See Screenshot..

good distributor.png (58.68 KiB) Viewed 901 times

[adafruit]

you can also try http://www.digikey.com and if they do not have the adafruit product, just request "no catalog request item". they have a ton of postal only options.

[additional001]

you can also try http://www.digikey.com and if they do not have the adafruit product, just request "no catalog request item". they have a ton of postal only options.

How do I go about doing a, "no catalog request item" search/purchase? I've looked all over digikey.com and I can't seem to find any information or option to do so with.