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I finally finished my 15 foot Whaler. The bow hatch took forever to come because they were backordered. OK, I lived with it but now it's getting dumb.

The first one warped so bad you could take the anchor out of the anchor locker without opening it. Eric was nice enough to send me another one. Unfortunately FedEx wants no part of that. It came in two pieces despite being marked fragile all over the package.

I sent Eric pictures and an e-mail and he promised to send another. I suggested they install a piece of junk plywood in there to keep it from getting broken again. Today it came...it almost looks like it's done on purpose. It's smashed so bad its splintered.

So FedEx, you stink as far as I'm concerned. It's marked fragile and it sure isn't treated anything like that. For the rest of my life I will never ship anything FedEx. It's pretty bad when that's all you do, and thats how you do it. FedEx...YOU STINK!

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I had a problem like this with ups and some parts for my smoker. They SHATTERED the parts when they were clearly marked glass!

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Try UPS. :(

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Given your description; the problem lies with FedEx. It seems Specialty Marine has made reasonable attempts to make good on the deal. Why entitle the article "speciality marine shipping problems!"? Why not put the blame where it belongs?

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mike........i think i did! read what i said. stop being so defensive. im almost positive i made sense.

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My father in law had the same experience with Fed Ex. He built a Sakonnet RPS for my friend Jason's 16 Whaler had Fed Ex box it and ship it. The seat showed up to Jason's house with one side destroyed. The item was fully insured however, it took a lot of run around for Fed Ex to finally agree to cover the damages they caused in shipping. My father in law ended up rebuilding all of the broken pieces and shipping them out to Jason where his father removed the broken parts and reassembled the seat. You can see it here.

The blame in this case was on Fed Ex as it would seem to lie in your case. Sounds like Specialty has gone out of their way to help. Honestly I would look into the United States Postal Service for shipping this item. They have always been great for me to work with.

I think Mike's point is the title may initially mislead one to think your blame is being directed at Specialty.

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As Jeff said, I think the title is off base.

Your post makes it clear that FedEx is to blame, I was pointing out that the title is misleading - a bit on the sensationalist end of things.

Stop being so defensive.

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I agree with Mike. When I first saw the title of this post, the first thing I thought of was that Specialty Marine screwed up. I've had several very positive transactions with Specialty Marine so I found it interesting that someone had a problem with them.....that was until I read the article. The title is mis-leading.

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I had a problem with FedEx five years ago... had the winning bid on ebay for a Lionel Train transformer from the early fifties. (original box with original instruction sheet) Arrived with a puncture on the outside shipping box. My fears were realized when I opened it up and found the transformer in pieces. Called FedEx they came and picked it up, handed me a receipt and then a week later they claimed they had no record of it ever being shipped!!! I will never use them again.

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I've done a lot of shipping and "Fed-Ex" is the worst period, it's almost always broken when it arrives, Fed Ex driver's are always hanging around my office drinking the free coffee. We had a fed ex driver show up the other day, he pointed out that he could NOT take the package since he was "Air" and the package was marked "Ground", I asked "Why do we even use them, they are "COMPLETELY USELESS", I called 1-800- fed ex and got someone who did not have command of the English language helping me, I stayed with him because, he was really trying so hard to rectify the problem, I got the package out but, it was like pulling teeth, it ended up going "AIR", and we got whacked with a $700 over night delivery charge for a Governor for a Diesel engine that was NOT "Priority" nor marked "AIR".

USPS is pretty slow, and it stand's a GREAT chance of being lost, and "ON TIME" Delivery is no longer guaranteed, the 2 lb pack delivered anywhere in the U.S. over night before 12 pm for $10.99 is gone, it's charged by zones and wt. now.

UPS is your best bet (around here anyway), "Brown" is always on the move, you never see their driver's hanging out drinking coffee at every stop. Free Tracking (GOOD TRACKING) you can see when the item was recieved/shipped at every transfer point along the way with a time/date stamp.
mw

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I use FedEx as much as I can because I have found them to be excellent over the years. I have never had a damaged shipment using FedEx Ground or FedEx Home Delivery, which I cannot say the same about UPS or USPS.

I also like that they are typically less expensive than UPS and considerably faster in making the delivery.

UPS does a good job with ground shipments too and the US Postal Service is great with their Priority Mail service if you want to pay a little more.

I NEVER, EVER use USPS Parcel Post. That is just begging for package destruction and/or lost parcels.

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Hey Kitty,

I just sent you an email with some solutions, so let me know what you would like to do. I am sorry this has happened again!

It really is one of those times that you wonder how this could have actually happened twice in a row. I would have reinforced the package with a scrap piece of wood, etc. but we simply did not have anything available laying around; typically this doesn't happen very often so I figured the chances are, it will arrive to you in good condition. Over the last several months of shipping out these bow hatches, there has only been one other occurrence of the hatch arriving in 2 pieces. So, it happening twice in a row like this is really remarkable. Anyway, we are happy to work with you to make sure you get a bow hatch in good condition, even if it takes us 4 tries! If this kind of service continues we will definitely consider UPS.

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I have to share my latest UPS story:

My boat broke, or more specifically, the steering system suffered a catastrophic failure. To put it all back together, I needed a pair of hard-to-find-locally stainless steel fasteners. Nobody in Seattle had them and it was the Thursday afternoon before Labor Day weekend.

So what do I do? I look at McMaster-Carr's web site and lo, and behold, they have what I need. Never mind that I have to buy ten of them when I only need a pair, they have them in stock and can ship them THAT AFTERNOON. I order them with shipping via UPS Next Day Air effectively doubling the price of my order, but what the hell? My weekend of boating is saved!

I place the order and receive a confirmation that says the order has SHIPPED from their Los Angles warehouse at 4 something Thursday afternoon. Great! UPS will deliver it on Friday.

Friday comes and goes. Nothing. No UPS tracking update, nothing. Saturday morning UPS tracking shows it is in Redmond, WA but that is it. Sunday, no update. Monday, no update.

Tuesday morning the package arrives...FIVE DAYS after I ordered it delivered via UPS Next Day Air.

UPS can go to hell. I'm sticking with FedEx. At least FedEx has excellent and accurate tracking information.

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You know I think everyone has good and bad shipping experiences. I have been fortunate enough that all the eBay stuff I have done has always worked out. I personally use USPS Priority Mail for most of my shipping. If not them I will go UPS -- the only time I ever use FedEx if on overnight documents. FedEx seems to do that very well and has always got it done on time. My general mailing policy is over kill on the packaging -- make it indestructible and it will get there safe.