I have worked for UPS for five years, and I also have shipped lots of books over the last five years. Media rate is offered by the USPS (postal service) only.....UPS (United Parcel Service) does not offer that rate. It's easy to confuse the two if just going by the intials...way too similar! The media rate is great if your package meets the requirements and you're not in a hurry.
Also, to correct an error in this article, United Parcel Service (UPS) DOES OFFER FREE SHIPPING MATERIALS! You can go to the website and order boxes, envelopes and labels (you have to set up a UPS acct, which is free). Also, you can pay for shipping and print your labels directly online thru the company website or Paypal. UPS does charge to pick up a pkg at your home unless you meet some kind of account criteria (I don't remember what those are), BUT you CAN easily get the pkgs to UPS without charge by one these methods: you can give your pkg to any UPS driver whenever you see the big brown truck (I know my driver always starts downtown, so I load up my UPS boxes & head to Main Street about 9:30 a.m. and just give them to him)....you can also drop them off at a UPS Store, a UPS Customer Center, an Authorized Shipping Outlet, or a UPS Drop Box (these are scattered around town and look like postal mail boxes, only brown, of course!). Another plus with UPS is that ALL packages are easily trackable, whether it's an envelope or box. I have had more than one bad experience trying to find out where a pkg has been thru the postal service. A lot of times they just flat out don't know and can't tell you how to find it. Also, UPS's shipping rates are now pretty competitive with the mail service's, especially if you are wanting to have the item insured. UPS shipping includes insurance up to $100. ALL insurance is extra thru the post office. Also, just like the postal service, delivery time with UPS is based on distance. You can ship an item ground rates and if it's close enough, it could arrive the next day, or two days...whatever...go to UPS.com and look at the View Service Guide under Calculate Time and Cost. They stand behind their guarantees, and claims are easily filed. My experience with postal claims hasn't been too good....they aren't organized in how they do it and it seems to take forever.
Hope this helps.....it's from my vast shipping knowledge earned thru the school of hard knocks!
quote:Originally posted by czbkz:
I would like to know if anyone has worked with UPS's media mail rates. I know they have them but I was kind of turned of by the whole thing when I called the 800 # & the CS rep had NO idea what I was talking about. I told her I was looking at a UPS brochure in my hand at the time that talk about media mail but gave no rates. I never could find the actual rates on their website & eventually gave up for the moment.
I have to say that I LOVE PP multiorder shipping. It has been much better the past several months (w/o all the "post office connectivity" issues and all).