For several years, I’ve loved Amazon deliveries. A bit pricey, but the convenience of having this excellent retailer drop everything at your door can NOT be beat.
But today undid all those years of superb service. Not through any fault of Amazon, but because the ‘Hood is…well…a ‘Hood. Once or twice in the past packages that supposedly were delivered haven’t shown up. But I haven’t thought much about it: they’re cheap and I’m busy.
But today, for cryin’ out loud!
I ordered a stupid little metal sprinkler. Not expensive — yea, verily, pretty cheap. But for that very reason, it was NOT something I wanted to traipse across the city to get from Home Depot or Lowe’s.
Off to dinner with M’Hijito this evening. When I get back, here’s an email from Amazon with a photo showing exactly where their delivery person placed the package. Exactly where she or he should have placed it: good job.
Problem is: no such package appeared out there.
Translation: one of the local porch pirates must have stolen it.
One of our techie neighbors set up some cameras with which he actually recorded a thief FOLLOWING an Amazon truck, stopping where each delivery was made, jumping out, running up to the door, grabbing the package, and running back to her car with it.
I should have known better, then, than to pay Amazon to send something I could’ve picked up at the local Home Depot. But ohhhhh no! I just had to save a half-hour or 45 minutes of driving time and stand-in-line time.
Dumb, huh?
Welp. It’s not Amazon’s fault. But I can’t afford to pay for things I never receive (supposedly they’re crediting my account with a refund…we’ll see!). And when I need something, I need it NOW, not after it’s been delivered and stolen and then I’ve had to drive to a store to get it. Might as well go direct to the store: hold the time to order it; hold the theft aggravation; hold the time to report the theft to Amazon.
Too bad: Amazon has been an enormous convenience. But when convenience turns to frustration…what’re ya gonna do?
Where I live, Amazon will deliver to lockers. There are some outside the grocery store, among other places. They notify you when it’s dropped off, and give you a code to pick it up. I bet there’s something like that near you.
You don’t have to hope the store has it, and you don’t have to hope no one steals it. Best of both worlds!
Yeah, you can get those here, too. But…my front patio/porch has a watering system that sprays EVERYTHING — every day, in this heat. Two or three times a week when it’s cooler. I’m afraid their locker thing would quickly grow a shell of rust! 😀
Alternatively, you can have Amazon deliveries sent to the Whole Foods on Camelback. This entails a 20-minute drive — each way: 40 minutes round trip — through annoying traffic; then having to stand in line and prove who you are to get the package. Not hardly worth the trouble!!!
Seriously: I could go over to the neighborhood hardware store, buy the sprinkler, turn around, drive home, and stop for lunch on the way back in less time than it would take to schlep to 20th Street & Camelback. That might be fine if I were inclined to buy groceries there…but gimme a break! I can’t afford to buy a week’s worth of groceries at Whole Foods!
A 7/11 very close to me has lockers just outside their front door.
I imagine other stores do too.
I always make a bigger order to Amazon to get free shipping so some things wouldn’t fit in the lockers I’ve seen.
I’ll have to look into that. There’s a mailboxes store in one of the corner shopping centers here…wouldn’t be surprised but what they will collect your Amazon deliveries for you.