Making a Freight return.
We know you want this marble to disappear and we know you want money back in your account. But for whatever reason this is coming back, we need to be smart in how it is done.
- We will email you a BOL (Bill of Lading – a shipment cannot go anywhere without one).
- You will want to make 2 Copies, one for you to sign and give to the driver and one for the driver to sign.
- The truck will not come until you call them and say, “my shipment is ready to be collected”. The 800 number is on the BOL.
- The shipment will be picked up in the same way it was dropped off, so a driver with a truck with a lift-gate and pallet truck. The shipment will need to be in the same place making pick up easy (it cannot for example be stuck at the end of a 100FT gravel driveway). I know this is an effort but you want the pallet truck to be able to easily collect this crate/pallet. Do not start packing the pallet/crate until it is in a spot that a fork truck can easily get to. A smooth flat surface.
- The shipment will need to be carefully packed and secure. If it is not in a crate then you will need to shrink wrap it, tightly and securely, shrink wrapping the product to the pallet so it cannot slide off the pallet.
- Take pictures of the shipment before it ships, if you can take one of it being loaded onto the truck.
- Pictures are VERY important. If UPS drops this shipment later during the journey and we get in a box of destroyed tiles that are half the size of what you shipped, then we can compare pictures and making a claim against UPS is very easily.
- Also it will ensure the driver is just that little more careful with it, as he knows you have pictures of the condition it left in.
- Pictures really are the key. When the driver signs for the shipment he is signing that the product is being collected in good order and well packed. You want that piece of paper.
- Please send us pictures as soon as it is picked up. Then when it arrives our end, we can compare the images.
- Any questions please let us know logistics@thebuilderdepot.com
What the customer shipped (it could have been packed better, the product is not secured to the pallet). But if the driver was not happy he should have asked for it to be done better and not signed for it.
A signed BOL you can see the Drivers signature on the bottom right (and he got a picture of the product in the same shot)
What we got back – a complete mess. UPS dropped the shipment threw the tiles in a box and broke them all. For the customer UPS’s error was their win, as they did not have to pay a restocking fee and no shipping cost. We just refunded them and we filed the claim with UPS. But this was only possible because the pictures are so clear. Words so difficult to explain it is true a picture really is worth a thousand words.
