Need advice on UPS debacle

Thread Starter

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
I recently sold the old 1988 Dynapath Delta 20 control system out of my old CNC mill.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/253189786151?ssPageName=STRK:MESOX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1559.l2649

These parts are NOT cheap. They are ever harder and harder to find, and they command a pretty penny. If I were to sell each card and component individually I could have gotten more for them but I was not motivated to do that.

My original $1600 asking price was based on the next-closest-thing I could find on eBay:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Autocon-Dy...899386?hash=item233ac5d67a:g:Qy8AAOxy3yNTf1n9

It didn't sell so I dropped the price a couple hundred and relisted. And again, and again, each time by $200+, until it finally sold for $500. I wasn't happy with the $500, but supply & demand, ya know. So I sold it for $500 with the idea it was worth a lot more, based on comparables found on eBay.

When I went through the UPS online wizard, there was a box to input the value of the item being shipped. I put $1,000. This is the first time I've shipped with UPS and I didn't devote a lot of thought to the number I put in that box; just the "gut feel" of what it was worth.

upload_2017-11-1_12-3-24.png

UPS "lost" the box between hops and it was never delivered (I'm pretty sure they kicked it off a loading dock or ran it over with a forklift, and then threw it in the dumpster). I've already gone through the 10-day "investigation" phase and now we're into the "claim" phase. I've already reimbursed my buyer his $500 and now it's my turn to be reimbursed by UPS. I thought "sweet, I'll actually get what I thought it was worth!" But no, they want proof of value. Why then did they ask me the value? I thought it would be easy-peasy. I put $1k in the box, paid a premium for insurance on that value (so I thought), and that should be that. And I DID pay extra to list it with a value of $1000 over $500. Here's the difference:

upload_2017-11-1_12-6-49.png
upload_2017-11-1_12-7-25.png


Here's what they say:

upload_2017-11-1_12-0-27.png


I feel that I'm owed $1,000 but the way they have me over a barrel I can't very well prove it (and I shouldn't friggin have to). I feel like if I submit the eBay listing showing that the auction was won @ $500, it's a safer bet that they'll actually pay me that. But if I try to prove it's worth $1,000 all I have are comparables on eBay. I'm not sure they'll entertain that - and I don't want to end up no compensated at all, because I made a crappy case for myself.

Anybody here have experience with UPS in these matters and predict or advise what I should do?
 

tranzz4md

Joined Apr 10, 2015
310
Come up with an invoice or catalog listing of the original system. They'll settle for $1k.

Sure you'll hafta work to come up with that. If it takes you 2 hours you're still getting between $250 and $500/ hr!
 

MaxHeadRoom

Joined Jul 18, 2013
28,617
I have had my share of UPS nightmares, It is a bit like taking on a steamroller, once it starts moving there is not alot to do except get out of the way.
In the end I found one of the women in the local office where I picked up any customs/Importation paper work for clearance purposes, (I cleared my own).
If I had a problem I would give her a call and being on the inside, she new exactly who to contact and straighten it out.
I just got lucky.
But all I can say is you have to keep calling and asking for the right department but most times it turns out a compromise.
Max.
 

Thread Starter

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
Come up with an invoice or catalog listing of the original system. They'll settle for $1k.

Sure you'll hafta work to come up with that. If it takes you 2 hours you're still getting between $250 and $500/ hr!
I've been looking. Thing is, they're custom systems. The kind of thing you price via quote, not catalog. And I haven't been able to find anything like that. If I could, we would probably find a price tag of 5 digits.
 

GopherT

Joined Nov 23, 2012
8,009
I've been looking. Thing is, they're custom systems. The kind of thing you price via quote, not catalog. And I haven't been able to find anything like that. If I could, we would probably find a price tag of 5 digits.
What you hoped it would sell for and what the market was willing to pay are two different things. The most recent sale was $500 and, therefore, the best available market price. The market price of $500 is even more accurate because you offered it repeatedly at various higher prices in the recent past.

In the end, it was your fault for over-valuing the device and paying for too much insurance. What you are trying to do is a type of insurance fraud and could conclude with more trouble than a perceived loss of $500 which you were happy with if the part was actually delivered.
 

Thread Starter

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
What you hoped it would sell for and what the market was willing to pay are two different things. The most recent sale was $500 and, therefore, the best available market price. The market price of $500 is even more accurate because you offered it repeatedly at various higher prices in the recent past.

In the end, it was your fault for over-valuing the device and paying for too much insurance. What you are trying to do is a type of insurance fraud and could conclude with more trouble than a perceived loss of $500 which you were happy with if the part was actually delivered.
Yeah you're right. I guess I'll just eat the $5 real loss in overpayment of insurance plus the imagined loss of $500 in "value."

(I'm not being sarcastic)
 

MrAl

Joined Jun 17, 2014
11,389
Hi,

Did you pay the 70 dollars shipping cost too already? I would hope you get that back too so $570 total at least.

Used stuff does not usually sell for the brand new price and can be significantly lower. That's except for used cars which often sell for two times what they are worth in the book value. It's hard to explain why something used should be worth so much.

This is a question that comes up when dealing with regular insurance companies too that cover home losses and stuff like that. How do you prove for example how much you paid for a PC system that you built yourself when the individual parts where bought separately and total perhaps two thousand dollars. It's not only custom, but also used, yet to REPLACE it you have to pay for new parts again.
 
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#12

Joined Nov 30, 2010
18,224
I have seen this in many forms. In my experience, there is no point in paying for insurance on anything you don't have a retail receipt for. If you have a retail receipt, the buyer could buy it locally for the retail price, therefore there is no reason to ship the product. Catch 22.

The U.S. post office taught me the principle of, "You got what you paid for, regardless of whether it was what you asked for or what you needed." I sent a few pages of a newspaper to my mother and paid 5X the price of a first class stamp because I told the clerk I wanted the fastest method available. The clerk marked it, "5th class book rate" and took 8 days to deliver it instead of the 3 days that first class would have taken. This is how you need a $15 modulator valve and end up buying a whole transmission, and it's legal. This is how you need a $100 fan motor and end up buying a whole $3000 air conditioner, and it's legal. You got what you paid for, regardless of whether it's what you asked for or what you needed.
 

MrAl

Joined Jun 17, 2014
11,389
I have seen this in many forms. In my experience, there is no point in paying for insurance on anything you don't have a retail receipt for. If you have a retail receipt, the buyer could buy it locally for the retail price, therefore there is no reason to ship the product. Catch 22.

The U.S. post office taught me the principle of, "You got what you paid for, regardless of whether it was what you asked for or what you needed." I sent a few pages of a newspaper to my mother and paid 5X the price of a first class stamp because I told the clerk I wanted the fastest method available. The clerk marked it, "5th class book rate" and took 8 days to deliver it instead of the 3 days that first class would have taken. This is how you need a $15 modulator valve and end up buying a whole transmission, and it's legal. This is how you need a $100 fan motor and end up buying a whole $3000 air conditioner, and it's legal. You got what you paid for, regardless of whether it's what you asked for or what you needed.
Hi,

Interesting way to look at it.

What irks me the most is that we cant even be sure what we got is what we expected to get until we get it home, open the box, and try it out. These days i find that there is such a variance in just the interpretation of what something should do is so large that i cant be sure what i am getting anymore until i try it out.
 

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
13,079
What irks me the most is that we cant even be sure what we got is what we expected to get until we get it home, open the box, and try it out. These days i find that there is such a variance in just the interpretation of what something should do is so large that i cant be sure what i am getting anymore until i try it out.
It's Pig in the Poke for sure. I'm waiting for a HP surplus DL380 G5. It might be spotless or it might be a pig.
 

GopherT

Joined Nov 23, 2012
8,009
About 10 years ago, my mother heard about some special collectable having a value of $10k and she happened to have two of them. Her evidence was an eBay sale. After doing some research for her, I was convinced she had a fortune. A month later I was at a beer exchange and the topic came up. A then another guy, who happened to work at the post office told us about the scam.

One friend posts a special item on eBay for an exceptionally high price and another friend buys it.

The friend reports that it never arrived.

The friend gets reimbursed by eBay.

The the seller collects insurance from the post office.

All for a 10-year-old stuffed animal that original sold for $6.
 

MrAl

Joined Jun 17, 2014
11,389
You're kidding I hope. It's for Debian Linux 64. That's my standard OS for development and general server service.
Hi,

No just wondering what kind of os systems can be handled byt that thing.
I was wondering if you could set it up like a regular home computer for general purpose use like web surfing and computer simulations and stuff like that, rather than as a server. Right now i use an 8 core but it's a regular system not really intended to be a server or anything.
What made me look twice was that it seems to be able to handle two processors. I might be interested in a unit that could handle two 8 core CPU's.
 

MrAl

Joined Jun 17, 2014
11,389
Nothing, if UPS loses it. Inept c..ts. (expletive modified)
Sorry to hear about that. I hope it works out eventually.
What is ironic is they are doing the same thing they accuse you of doing. They inflate the price then later ask for more information.

What i think you should demand is not only at least the 500, but also if you paid the premium for the shipping which was based on 1000 dollars retail, that they must reimburse you for the insurance too.
What i mean by this is that they might say that the price being 500 and the insurance was (say) 50 dollars on 1000 dollars, but since the price they only recognize is 500 and not 1000 then they must pay you the difference. Since they might declare it worth 500 yet they let you pay for 1000, then you should get say 25 back (roughly) because it was not really worth 1000.
I hope i am explaining this clearly.
I had forgotten that they may keep the insurance premium as that is probably not ENTIRELY refundable, but since they skimp on the value of the product then they must correlate the insurance premium to that new price too. So you should get back roughly 1/2 the insurance premium as well as the 500.
I hope this makes sense.
In other words, if you declared it worth a million dollars and they made you pay 10000 dollars for insurance, then later it turns out to be worth 100 to them, then they should reimburse you for a lot of that 10000 because they derated the value and so the insurance premium should be derated also.
I would insist on this policy being followed, at the very least.
I would also question and question and question why they let you pay that premium in the first place if they might not be willing to honor it.
 
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nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
13,079
Hi,

No just wondering what kind of os systems can be handled byt that thing.
I was wondering if you could set it up like a regular home computer for general purpose use like web surfing and computer simulations and stuff like that, rather than as a server. Right now i use an 8 core but it's a regular system not really intended to be a server or anything.
What made me look twice was that it seems to be able to handle two processors. I might be interested in a unit that could handle two 8 core CPU's.
I have the g5 2 cpu 8 core system on order so it's only two quad core CPU's, you need the G7 for hex-core or G9 for 10 core.
436526-001: I/O systemboard (mother board) - Supports Intel Xeon 50xx, 51xx, 52xx, 53xx and 54xx processors (quad-core)

I plan to configure it as a normal desktop configuration by adding a nice NVIDIA PIC-E video card instead of the standard 'headless' 32meg ATI internal card. Most desktop windows OS (including home versions of 10) won't have a clue how to handle the power and system management capabilities of this machine but Linux will make it run like a F1 race-car on multi-cpu aware applications.
 

Thread Starter

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
I submitted the claim paperwork yesterday for $500. I provided the eBay listing showing it sold for $500 with the tracking # attached. Hopefully it goes smoothly.
 

MrAl

Joined Jun 17, 2014
11,389
I submitted the claim paperwork yesterday for $500. I provided the eBay listing showing it sold for $500 with the tracking # attached. Hopefully it goes smoothly.
Hi,

I wonder if there is any chance that they might find it eventually. They might stall for time so they might find it and avoid the payoff point.

I had a package coming through USPS (not UPS) that got lost for over a month. What a pain that was, calling here and there and nobody knows anything, and rude secretaries. They went through some big changes here in NJ so the way they routed the mail changed drastically.
 

MrAl

Joined Jun 17, 2014
11,389
I have the g5 2 cpu 8 core system on order so it's only two quad core CPU's, you need the G7 for hex-core or G9 for 10 core.
436526-001: I/O systemboard (mother board) - Supports Intel Xeon 50xx, 51xx, 52xx, 53xx and 54xx processors (quad-core)

I plan to configure it as a normal desktop configuration by adding a nice NVIDIA PIC-E video card instead of the standard 'headless' 32meg ATI internal card. Most desktop windows OS (including home versions of 10) won't have a clue how to handle the power and system management capabilities of this machine but Linux will make it run like a F1 race-car on multi-cpu aware applications.

Hi again,

You mean the g9 would handle two 8 core CPU's for a total of 16 cores?

Do any of them work with AMD processors? Those are cheaper 8 core processors even though they are not really the full 8 cores but rather 8 integer cores and 4 floating point cores instead of 8 integer and 8 float cores.
Yeah AMD cheated on their 8 core CPU's and still are today.
 
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