NEVER SHIP USPS!

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tajuano
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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by tajuano » Fri Apr 15, 2011 12:46 am

I would think that any animal would be in stress over shipping experience. But finches are most sensitive to any changes. People do send chickens with UPS but a lot of times those poor chickens have problems from stress too.

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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by finchmix22 » Thu May 19, 2011 8:19 pm

Thank God!!! I have had horrible experiences with USPS too, but not with live animals. Can you repost the pics here?
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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by 30 Seconds to Bob » Tue Aug 28, 2012 10:40 pm

I know this is a very old topic, but being a US postal employee since I was 19 (26 years), I can't resist. It has NEVER been allowable to ship canaries, finches or hookbills of any kind through the US mail. Only day old chicks, fowl and waterfowl, pigeons and doves, period.

If you brought them to my counter, I would not accept them. The theory behind allowing day old chicks and certain waterfowl is that they should be able to survive without food or water for two whole days, even if an overnight delivery is expected or guaranteed.

The post office utilizes commercial airlines and FED-X for its overnight and two day shipments. Have you ever been on a plane and missed a connection due to some kind of weather delay or security issue? Your birds may do the same. Things don't always go perfectly.

That being said, myself and everyone I know would make every effort to expidite any bird through our office whether or not we knew they were "acceptable". I have on several occasions pried up corners of boxes to drop food and water into containers of baby chicks when the recipients didn't come to claim them. I've even run out to pet shops on my lunch break to buy them food.

If you're going to badmouth the post office, go right ahead, but just realize that every day I have people coming to me because of bad experiences with Fed -X or UPS. This is the honest to God's truth! Nobody is perfect. We're usually doing the best we can with an ever diminishing work force and constant budget cuts. I once flew to New Jersey and back in one day just to get a pair of canaries. I would never try to "ship" a bird on a plane as cargo. Birds are too fragile. JMO. Bob
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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by Audio51 » Wed May 29, 2013 10:16 am

[quote="30 Seconds to Bob"]

30 Seconds to Bob....I would never bad-mouth the USPS...in fact I have enough confidence in them that I have no problem shipping or receiving birds thru this method. Birds are always shipped in approved containers and all the edges/corners are sealed with tape. Seed is spread on the floor of the box and orange slices or apples added for moisture. Many have special water containers designed specifically for shipping birds that have the top edges turned in and a sponge with small holes floats on the surface to prevent sloshing. I have received bird shipments many times thru USPS ands have shipped a couple of times. I only had one shipment with problems and that appeared to be rought handling (box dented), but that can happen with airline shipping too. I mostly don't ship birds out because I have to drive about an hour round trip to a branch that accepts any kind of "Lives" for shipping. I work from 7 AM to 4:30 PM so would have to take time off asn lose pay to ship out. When I received, they come to my local office 5 minutes away and the office calls me when they come in.

I understand that the USPS is considering relaxing the regulations to allow shipping of finches in the near future and has asked for feedback from consumers on this topic. While they stated they are not required to take the feedback into consideration in making the final decision, they still wanted to know what the public thought. Personally I hope they decide to offer this service, even if they increase the cost a little. I am one of those people who is about 2 hours from the nearest airport that ships/receives birds so the Post Office is one of the few methods I have for obtaining new stock...

Vicki in Paradise, CA

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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by lou » Wed May 29, 2013 11:54 am

Hi Vicki, welcome to the forum
lou in grass valley

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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by Audio51 » Wed May 29, 2013 12:02 pm

Thanks, Lou! Didn't know you were here too! :D

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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by 30 Seconds to Bob » Wed May 29, 2013 12:34 pm

I wasn't even going to bring this up because of all the human lives lost in this tragedy, but seing how someone added to this topic I feel it is warranted.
The week of the Oklahoma and midwest tornadoes, my little post office alone (one of about 200,000 throughout the country) paid out over a dozen refunds for EXPRESS MAIL FAILURE. Express mail failure is when the overnight package fails to make it to it's destination overnight. None of these packages were going to areas directly affected by the tornadoes, it was just due to airport delays and missed connections via our hub in Tenessee. These could have been your finches, people. THIS HAPPENS EVERY DAY, SOMEWHERE.
Now I realize that a one day delay doesn't necessarily mean imminent death for all live contents, but delicate finches 48 hours in a dark box, possibly not being able to find their water............really? Some have argued that this aviary or that aviary does it all the time, but are they really going to tell you about the shipments gone wrong? Maybe if you factory produce cage birds like poultry, that is how you view them. A few dead birds are like a drop in the bucket. Maybe someone should petition the airlines to not charge such outrageous prices for handling a small box with live birds in it (in cabin), instead of relying on the post office to relax it's standards? Bob
3 canaries
2 orange cheeked waxbill finches
2 java finches, 1 split to normal, 1 white
2 bourke parakeets
1 american staffordshire/american pit bull terrier
1 boston/jack russel terrier mix
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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by cindy » Wed May 29, 2013 12:50 pm

We had an incident on one of the facebook groups of birds being shipped in the winter and there were complications due to human error. Within the shipping container were hookbill babies and finches, smaller birds. For some reason the birds in transport carrier did not arrive at their destination....it was discovered quiet a long time afterwards (I believe a day later) that the container was never loaded on the plane but left on the tarmac in freezing weather overnight. All the small birds perished and the larger hookbill babies were weakened. The breeder sending the birds was called back to the airport to pick up the hookbills which had to be nursed back to health.

There are again pros and cons to both ways of shipping and it is a personal decision to do either. There are no guarantees just the hope that your birds arrive safely to their destination.

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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by Audio51 » Wed May 29, 2013 2:59 pm

But these things can happen even with airline shipping. I have heard some pretty bad horror stories about that too. Come to think of it....I have heard a few bad stories from people who picked up birds in person.

And Bob...... petitioning the airlines to lower the rates will not move the airport any closer to those of us who live in rurual area. It is a 4 hour round trip for me pluse the time waiting for the ariline to offload the birds and get them to the cargo area (about another hour and a half to 2 hours). The only time I did ship via airline the arrival time was at 10:30 PM so it was nearly 2 AM before we got home. I ended up missing a day of work due to lack of sleep.

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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by cindy » Wed May 29, 2013 3:26 pm

I feel that each of us whether we choose to use the airlines or go through USPS need to do so with understanding that it is a gamble either way, things can go very well or terribly wrong. It is a personal choice each of us need to make.

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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by Audio51 » Wed May 29, 2013 4:28 pm

Agreed, Cindy!

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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by debbie276 » Wed May 29, 2013 4:36 pm

You also must understand that until the regulations are changed, if you ship USPS and something happens to the birds you can not put in a claim because it was against the regulations to ship them in the first place. But yes, bottomline it is a personal choice whether to follow the USPS regulations or not with the chance of being stopped at any point along the way.
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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by Audio51 » Wed May 29, 2013 4:58 pm

With all the arguments for and against shipping USPS, I have never heard of anyone having thier shipment stopped at any point.

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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by Sally » Sat Jun 01, 2013 8:14 pm

lou wrote: Hi Vicki, welcome to the forum
lou in grass valley
Hi Vicki, you've been around for a while, just keeping quiet! :lol:

This is not exactly a story about birds, but I recently had a shipment of mealworms sent to me via USPS. The company that I ordered from suggested that if temps were over 80 degrees, I have the package held at the post office for pickup, which I agreed to. The package arrived at my local post office after hours on Friday, and being a small post office, it is closed on Saturday. Since I hadn't heard anything, I went to the post office Saturday morning, because I know there are workers there even if it is closed. When I asked about my package, they had just placed it on the truck for delivery, because this was Memorial weekend, and they were afraid that I would not get them and they would die over a 3-day weekend. The mail lady planned to leave the package just inside my gate if I wasn't home. I felt this was very thoughtful, and I told them how grateful I was that they were trying to help me. If the package had sat at a closed post office for three days, I might have received $100 worth of dead worms!
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Re: NEVER SHIP USPS!

Post by Audio51 » Sat Jun 01, 2013 11:34 pm

I have been a member for quite a while. I can't even remember the last time I posted here though. I was doing a search for info about USPS shipping and the thread came up.

My experiences with the USPS have been positive too... Steve....the guy from my local Post Office has alway made sure my birds were safe until I could pick them up, He called me once at 6 AM to let me know there were there and had me come in the employee entrance to get them.

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