I shipped my rear wheel by UPS thought United Cycle to Chris King in Portland Oregon for Warranty work. I knew that by that at the time of year when i send in the wheel (June 2007) that they would be behind, so I waited about 2 months and then called them to ask if i could get a tracking number to follow it back to Canada.

I was surprised to hear that they had not received it.

My first instinct was there must be a mistake, so the tech i was talking with did some looking around the warehouse, shiping receiving, as well as the shop and called me back the next day to let me know that he was 90% sure that i had not arrived.

At the same time i gave United Cycle a call who shipped the wheel out on my behalf to got a tracking number. After looking up the tracking number i then learned it had made it from Edmonton to Spokane Idaho in about 2 days. It never left the depot. I phoned UPS and asked them if they knew what had happened. They issued a trace rout on it, basically to see were it ended up if it got scanned in the wrong depot and sent to some other location. After a few weeks of no contact I called back and they told me that Chris King had received it and that it was signed for.

Great! Or so i thought.

So after about a week I called Chris King and asked if they could give me a tracking number to follow it back to Edmonton. I didn’t want any issues during its trip back to Canada. The man i talked to said they still had not received it. Strange i was told that it had been received, and they had signed confirmation that it had been delivered. He thought it might have come in on a late night and wasn’t in the system yet. So he had look and wasn’t able to find it by description, serial number, or tracking number. Nothing at all from Edmonton.

Chris King then called UPS to see what was going on and asked for a shipping manuscripts that contained every shipment to and from there shop. Still nothing on there from Edmonton or matching my tracking number.

I called UPS and asked them if they were sure that some one received it and told them that Chris King has a list of all the incoming and out going packages in the last month and that my package was not on the list.

How could some one receive it, sign for it and yet still not actually get it? for that matter how could UPS say it was received and not have it show up on there own manuscripts. UPS told me that they cant do a trace on it because it was signed for and there for received.

Chris King then phoned UPS again and told them that they absolutely do not have the package, and that they have a list of what has come in and its not on there.

By this time 4 months of perfect riding weather had gone by and I still didn’t have my wheel back. My wheel was insured for $700 and retailed for about $850. I explained to the supervisors how my bike was my source of transportation and I had to borrow a wheel from my wife for the entire summer.

They finally issued an insurance claim and mailed the papers our. After two weeks United Cycle had not received the papers so they were contacted UPS and asked to have them faxed over. After about 30 min they arrived and were filled out, a copy of the invoice was sent with it.

Communication is key.

Another 2 weeks went by and i called to ask the status if the claim and they told me it was Void. I asked them why it would be void and why they didn’t feel the need to communicant any errors to myself or United Cycle. They told me it was because I didn’t supply a wholesale invoice, I explained to them that United Cycle didn’t buy the wheel. I did, and that i paid more than United Cycle paid for it.

So as it sits now United Cycle has to give UPS a Quote for industry pricing on a rear hub, spokes and a rim witch involves more leg work for them as well as ordering in the off season. United Cycle has ordered my replacement parts and is fronting the money to get the them in stock for me but hey now, my rim is on back order!

I saw a commercial from UPS saying that anything damaged or lost will be replaced 100%. But because united cycles name was on the in label it would seam like they don’t have to supply any service whats so ever. United Cycle has lost there profit margins to order me new parts and its not there fault.

UPS has spent close to 6 months now trying to avoid responsibility and trying to get out of paying the insurance amount. If United Cycle and my Self didn’t keep up on them i don’t think they would even know it was lost.

I contacted the local media to see if they could be of any help, and a day or so later i had a message on my phone at work saying my claim was now being dealt with the “UPS Package Information Supervisor”. I phoned her back left a friendly message. It was a regular game of phone tag. Nothing really productive came of this besides having a name of some one who knows what happened.

Before having this contact i had to explain the whole story about 6 times to various people, explaining to them that no you did loose it, and its not sitting at Chris King.

The only reason UPS exists it to get a product from Point A to Point B in the time line you Paid for. You pay the extra insurance in case something goes missing. I’m this case it did. And no one on there end knew until I called.

I also don’t understand how they can not pay the full insurance amount! The amount the wheel was insured for was not even enough for me to replace it in the first place.

So at this point in time, approximately 9 months after the original shipping date, i now have a wheel, my rim took a little over a month to come in and now United Cycle can submit the claim and get there money out of the whole fiasco.

What have i learned?

1. Well keeping a well organized record if the events learning up and to the closure of the issue is hand.
2. Contacting the media makes them jump.

Questions left unanswered?

1. Who is enjoying my “lost” wheel?
2. What good is insurance on a package if they don’t want to pay it?
3. If the package is to get from point A to point B and it doesn’t make it, why doesn’t someone get informed that there might be an issue.

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Tags - Bike | Chris King | Lost | United Cycle | UPS

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