My neighborhood stores have huge markups and bad customer service. I don’t love Amazon but they are a better alternative for most things.
Try using them as a reference guide instead of buying from them. I find what I’m looking for rhen loom up the products own website. A couple extra steps but it’s not like I’m out hunting and gathering, I’m in air conditioning and chair or taking a huge dump.
huge
Deeply unnecessary modifier here
No no, if you have ever witnessed my dumps, you would consider that modifier deeply necessary
and then probably cried
I didn’t ask for this information, never needed it, but here we are.
I can’t wait until Lemmy gets locally-stored user labels so I can label that guy “Likes to talk about his dumps”.
I’m sure most people here don’t remember when power strips and HDMI cables were $40 and coin batteries were like $15 each pre inflation because stores wanted to make money on them. We could only read, listen to, and watch what our local stores decided to stock and most things didn’t have reviews. If we needed a new power adapter for that one device with a special shaped connector, too bad. It’s literally impossible to buy it.
Sucks that my packages keep getting stolen
And that’s why in other countries, delivery services aren’t allowed to drop a package at the door unless you’ve explicitely told them to do so
Amazon totally drops packages outside in Ireland
Not true here in Sweden, tho. I work in parcel delivery and I’m instructed to leave at the door (or next to the mailbox if it doesn’t fit), at least if it’s Class A or Express. Class B get one delivery attempt and then sent to service point if unsuccessful.
Although I don’t do all types of parcels.
I am also from Sweden, I have always been called (or texted) and asked (if I am not home) if it is OK to leave it outside. Some call me before hand to check if I am home before trying to deliver it even. You can (most of the time) choose if you are OK with them leaving it outside if you aren’t home otherwise they will not do that unless you say it is OK through text or a call. But maybe only the delivery companies I have picked have this kind of policy. I never pick a class for my packages so maybe I always get b class? What kind get A class?
Calling every recipient sounds like your delivery person has quite a bit lower daily volumes than me to deal with. Or you always order Express. Class B has the lowest priority; the same as a regular postcard would have.
Some countries stupidly accept non delivery as the norm, and that’s on them.
If your delivery person leaves your package outside your house, that’s NOT, I repeat NOT delivered.
They got 99.9% of the way to delivering it and then abandoned it on the street at the very last step. It must be handed to an occupant or pushed through the letterbox to be delivered. This is obvious.
What do real delivery companies in normal countries do? If they can’t deliver the parcel, they don’t just drop it on the floor and wander off, because they’re not insane. They either try to leave it with a neighbour, or they try to deliver it again another day (or depending on the service, they may leave a paper slip in the letterbox indicating that it can be collected from the local depot).
Countries that accept delivery people throwing their stuff on the floor undelivered have nobody to blame for that but themselves. That is not the norm, it is not reasonable, and they only do it because the people in those countries allow it, and don’t do anything about it.
It’s madness. Utter insanity. Imagine if the postman did this with important letters!? “The letterbox is stuck, better just leave then on the floor outside!” Can you imagine! MADNESS.
I prefer having my shit left at the door as opposed to being bothered to have to come to the door to personally accept it from them.
I’m typically busy and I’ll get it when I get to it… But, I don’t live somewhere where I have to be paranoid that someone is just waiting to steal my shit either.
I have an unlocked box outside on the street where letters go. That’s where the postman leaves them. Tampering or stealing the mail = 30 years in prison.
nah I prefer them to leave. before covid the post here was notorious for not knocking, and dropping a card meaning you had to go to a post office and collect it in person, but only during business hours, you had to line up behind all the old people who paid bills at the post office, finally get your chance and if you are lucky they would find your parcel, but usually either way they would make out like you are being the biggest inconvenience in the world.
these days they drop and scan, sometimes knock, sometimes not, but it doesn’t matter. havnt had a theft ever
For me Amazon delivers to my doorstep, listens and acts on complaints if undelivered or product is faulty, arrange replacement for free, allow me to use stuffs for a month and then return no questions asked, and is way more cost effective.
Say whatever about their business practices, they beat local stores in every possible way and it’s not even close.
For me as a customer, local stores doesn’t make any possible sense.
Ehh, call me a 🤡 but I kinda like sitting at home to browse, pay for the thing that doesn’t even exist at another store, then go get it at the post office 2 blocks away from home, right beside the grocery store, on my way home when it’s ready.
I don’t think your a clown at all. That convieince of ordering hard to find stuff is alluring as fuck.
This is only my personal experience but…
I’ve never had a package stolen. Even when I lived in a sketchy apartment years ago. If it’s a high value item I either have it delivered to me at my work (this is a privileged position to have, I know) or get it delivered at an Amazon locker a mile or two down the road.
Would it be a pain in my ass if I lived in a high crime area, worked somewhere that didn’t accept my deliveries, and relied on public transport? Absolutely. But I’m guessing that’s not who the majority of Amazon’s customer base is.
It’s one of those opportunity crimes where the easiest victim generally picked. It usually comes down to just two things:
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How many people see your porch
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How easy is it to walk up and walk away?
You’d be surprised how much of a deterrent a mild inconvenience is. You’ll get significantly fewer packages that walk off if you live on a big hill, or have a bunch of steps, where it’s mildly inconvenient for someone to walk up.
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I lived in a high crime area and I still didn’t have any packages stolen. I lost more packages to the delivery person delivering it to the wrong apartment versus porch pirates.
Amazon Lock boxes are like PO boxes but free, you just order with one as a destination and you put a code in and it unlocks a locker with your item in it
I don’t like Amazon but I mean this does pretty much defeat porch piracy
I used to go to a local book store, until they stopped stocking any new science fiction. Then they went out of business and I was forced to buy books at Amazon as there was no other book store to go to.
We didn’t have a local book store. We had Border’s, Barnes and Noble, and a couple of used book shops. I frequented used book shops for the majority of my childhood and teenaged years. Then they all closed and it was just The Big B’s. And then Border’s went and it was just Barnes and Noble. I’m not convinced that this was all Amazon’s fault. I’m actually inclined to believe that Border’s and B&N both forced out the book stores and then got their crap pushed in by Amazon.
I’m in the middle of downtown in a small city shops are heavily weighed towards convenience or kick nacks. EG 2 different gift stores and no hardware store. Lots of convenience stores and two specialty markets but only one grocery store and that at least double the cost and 1/100th the selection of the chain stores with the floor space of 7-11.
Looking back small shops always had shitty prices and selection
Lol, I never thought of it that way. I will admit, though, that package theft was already a thing. It’s really bad if you live in an apartment.
Get a locking shipment container for deliveries. From Amazon, of course.
But what if someone steals the container before I can bolt it down? Sounds like an insecure bootstrap process to me.
My intent was absolutely this as a joke.
Be a local shop owner.
Have “opportunistic” prices.
Always try talking people into buying shit they don’t need.
Not_in_stock.jpg
“Customer support” = Its your fault, no refunds, go fuck yourself.
Why is Amazon taking over?
Yesterday, a user asked how I stopped using Amazon. I don’t have the heart to tell him, you just stop.
Honestly though, is there a site to find other places you can buy that’s not from amazon? Maybe ebay, alibaba, AliExpress? Those options aren’t as reliable and still have iffy ethical practices.
I quit Amazon in 2019, and eBay supplanted them. Sometimes I get eBay purchases delivered as Amazon drop ships and it pisses me off. All I can do is leave bad feedback, so I do.
It started taking 5 days for deliveries during COVID so I cancelled prime and just get $35 free shipping.
I did exactly the same. It’s fine if they can no longer ship in 2 days, but then lower the cost of Prime or something. It’s no longer worth it, and tbh I’m going to spend a lot less money on Amazon since I won’t order until I have enough for free shipping.
Ditched Amazon altogether when they started pushing Prime at every corner. Nobody needs to buy and get instant shipping for tons of useless crap
