UPS / Apple-like technology

In my specific area UPS is geared toward satisfying businesses over regular people. They must get their guaranteed overnight business packages delivered by some predetermined time, so running through apartment buildings to deliver packages to people who most likely are not there doesn't pay off for them. Often they come back later that same day.

But now they have localized drop off locker locations.

More convenient for them than for us.

Last week I was expecting a package important to me so I tracked it online. I'm signed up for email notifications but UPS did not come through with them. Otherwise I could have raced downstairs and caught the guy the moment he logged his notification. As it was, I found out an hour later, long after his truck left our block.

The driver had walked up to the front door of the building and put "sorry I missed you" notifications taped to the glass on the front door instead of attempting delivery. He did not use the call box he did not telephone anyone. He did not try to enter the building.

Another resident brought the notifications into the office.

He didn't even attempt any deliveries.

The lockers are easier for him.

The box would be delivered to the UPS locker 16 blocks away.

That's 32 blocks round trip. It is a major pain in the ass.

My problem is that I'm paying for a delivery service that I am not getting. The entire national system is truly exquisite but UPS drops the ball at the last moment on the last leg.

I can notify them and have them deliver it, but that would be 2 days delayed.

Here's the thing about the locker.

It's in a little coffee shop inside a building housing a bunch of businesses. The building interior is a maze.

Turns out, once you're inside the coffee shop then you realize it has doors straight onto a side street. But its address is the main building with its address on the main street. It is a very confusing location.

Once inside the coffee shop you are faced with a bank of lockers, various size squares with a large tv monitor in the center.

There is a slot labeled, "Official ID."

And another scanning screen to read the bar code on the note the UPS driver left on the building's front door.

The monitor has a telephone number you can call for help. But no telephone.

I inserted my driver's license and the machine beeped. But nothing happened.

I scanned the bar code, it scanned, but nothing happened.

I did this same thing fifteen times.

I'm going home.

Now highly agitated and cross I scrounged for lost traces of civility and asked the young woman serving coffee if she knows anything about the UPS lockers.

She doesn't. It's not her concern.

Sensing my frustration, and being a kind-hearted human she dropped her real job and came across to the other side of her counter and walked back with me to the tv monitor that gave no instructions whatsoever.

Suddenly the screen came to life with specific instructions.

"What did you do?"

     "I touched the screen."

"Oh."

Son of a bitch!

There is absolutely nothing on the screen that says "touchscreen" or "touch the screen to get started." The setup assumes that you'll automatically intuit you must touch the screen.

Minimalism such as you see with Apple products. No extraneous buttons. No superficial instructions.

My entire lifetime training is "don't touch the screen" and now it's assumed that I'll understand that to get started I must first just touch the screen.

Secondly, the screen tells you to enter the tracking code for your package, that is different from the bar code on the note left by the driver. It is a million-digit alpha-numeric code that is a total pain in the ass to enter. You have to watch each number/letter because some of them don't take and others take twice.

"the number you entered does not match our records."

I entered the million-digit code again.

"the number you entered does not match our records."

I entered the million-digit code again.

"the number you entered does not match our records."

I entered the million-digit code again.

"the number you entered does not match our records."

I entered the million-digit code again.

"the number you entered does not match our records."

I entered the million-digit code again.

"the number you entered does not match our records."

I entered the million-digit code again.

"the number you entered does not match our records."

I'm going home.

Then I look more closely at the teeny-tiny writing underneath the instructions to enter the tracking number. They show the tiniest example possible, too tiny to read, but the last six digits are circled.

They tell you to enter the tracking code but then show a tiny example of the last six digits circled in red.

They do not say, "enter the last 6 digits of the tracking code for your package." No. They say, "enter the tracking code.

I enter only the last six digits and one of the lockers pops open.

And now I'm put into rush hour traffic at the positive worst spot in the entire city. The unhappy juncture on Colfax at Lincoln and Broadway right at the capitol.

Where the lights change green yellow red green yellow red green yellow red green yellow red green yellow red green yellow red green yellow red green yellow red green yellow red as you creep forward by inches.

A-a-a-u-u-u-U-U-U-U-U-U-U-U-U-u-u-u-u-m-m-m-m-m

* breathing control*

I could walk home faster than traffic is moving.

And I walk very slowly.