[Elecraft] Shipping high value items by UPS

[Grant Youngman]

The thread started by the gentleman who thought his KX2 might be dead and needed to go to Elecraft motivated me to make this comment about shipping.

For several good reasons, I just sent my K3 to Elecraft for service for the first time ever.  Insured, double boxed, expensive Uline 3” plank foam cushion support for the inner carton, etc.   Because I insured it for a high value, I was required by UPS to take the carton to the local UPS Customer Service Center, not the UPS store, etc. to obtain a signature.  Don’t know if I’d scheduled a pickup that it would have been the same fire drill, but that wasn’t an option for me because of UPS schedules around here.

Got to the UPS Center at the airport  and was told that I had to UNPACK ALL of the cartons so they could see what was inside and determine that it wasn’t explosives (apparently there was an incident at FedEx back in February).   UPS did a sloppy job of retaping everything.  Nothing worse than having to cut open carefully packed and sealed containers to prove you’re not just another uni-bomber.  I bit my lips and was (mostly) friendly about it.  Worse than TSA … because they don’t have the chemical detection wipes and X-ray machines that TSA has.   So it’s a bigger than  average hassle.

Word to the wise — leave your  cartons untaped, take your tape gun with you, and close/tape the containers yourself.  (Maybe I’m the only person that didn’t know this was a current UPS policy?)

Grant NQ5T
K3 #2091 KX3 #8342