Random Facts about United Parcel Service
[Author’s note: I worked for UPS Corporate for about 2.5 years from 2005 to 2007. I made a lot of observations while working there. I thought I’d share them here in a series of never-ending articles. If I end up being assassinated for writing this article, I’ll leave the evidence in that place I left that thing that time before].
- The people who handle your packages are known internally as “throwers.”
- A UPS driver makes only left-handed turns, unless he’s stopping by to have sex with your wife - then any turn, left or right, is fair game.
- UPS owns the patent to the color Pullman Brown. Any use of this color by anyone else is strictly prohibited.
- Jim Casey, the UPS founder, got his start by delivering heroin to drug addicts, and by tailing people. Of course, in those days, it was all perfectly legal. Today, we would frown upon his shady shenanigans.
- Each year, UPS displays a United Way fundraising progress meter on the wall of the entrance to corporate. Unfortunately, it resembles a giant, engorged penis.
- You are allowed to have a maximum of fifteen items on your desk. In the old days, desk patrol would write tickets for disorderly desks. These days, your boss will indicate violation through passive-aggressive behavior.
- Tyler Perry, playwright and creator of the character Madea, is a former UPS employee.
- UPS is the largest shipper of pornography in the world.
- There is a bell in the UPS lobby. The CEO rings it whenever some major event happens, like a layoff or an acquisition. If you (a non-CEO) ring the bell without a corresponding major event, you’re fired.
- I wasn’t kidding about the roaches in the coffee machine.
- Brad Brown is not Antony Bordoli, but I am jealous of the publicity Antony has received, just for quitting his job.
- The frozen body of founder Jim Casey is in a cryogenic chamber in the documentation archive in the basement at corporate headquarters.
- It’s illegal to send non-urgent letters via UPS. This allows the United States Postal Service to maintain their postal monopoly for the good of mankind.
- UPS employees don’t get discounts on shipping, which is why the majority of UPS employees ship DHL.
- UPS employee badges contain RFID tags, which allow the company to track employee movement throughout every corporate-owned building. If you spend more that five minutes per hour in the bathroom, you are severely penalized.
- UPS was approached by the producers of the movie “Castaway.” The producers asked if UPS wanted to be the shipping company that would appear in the movie. UPS said “no.” FedEx said “yes.” The movie grossed 483 million dollars.
- Some guy (we’ll call him Dick) retired after 35 years. Dick took a celebratory vacation to Hawaii where he promptly died on the fourth hole of his first round of golf after retirement.
- When UPS first opened in Germany, they had a hard time attracting customers due to public perception. They finally determined that they weren’t popular with the Germans because the UPS uniforms looked too much like Hitler’s SS uniforms. Today, German delivery drivers wear red unitards.
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Non-urgent letters…hmmm, wonder what constitutes non-urgent? Maybe delivery to the recipient while they are still alive would qualify. Red unitards, LOL!
richd’s last blog post..NFL Preview - First ten teams
Brad, I find it interesting that there is a bell in the lobby. I had one in my branch. I wonder what would of happened had I instituted the “no ring” policy.
@richd - There’s a fine line between urgent and non-urgent. Unfortunately, the government makes the definition, so they could arrest you either way.
Danny - The only way to institute a no-ring policy is to have a guard for the bell. At UPS, the mall cops are stationed about 30 feet away, always waiting for someone to ring the bell. One time, I saw them wrestle a 5th grader to the ground when he rang the bell.
I love this post! Haha : ]
Jenna’s last blog post..How Many Refills Do I Have Left?
Your UPS stories remind me of my short employment at UPS. I’ll never forget my orientation where a room full of eager throwers awaited a promising future. An administrator came into the confrence room and hit the play button for a safty film then left before it started. Little did she know someone had left a porno in the VCR. Nobody knew what to do so we just sat there and watched.
Escalating retaliation and dishonesty from 5 supervisors in the Akron, Ohio building. The retribution and creation of an environment that is intimidating and hostile towards me. Yes I have done some things I am not proud of and have been disciplined for such things. Retaliating for a grievance I filed spun out of control from the supervisors I filed on, and one police report I filed on Chuck Kastor for threatening comments he made towards me at work.
I bought a recorder in May of 2003 and starting in June, I started to record every time I was told to go to the office from supervisors. I was getting tired of being lied to from the people who had me in the office at that time. They tells me one thing one day and another the next day. OJS rides are the # one topic. My boss helped me on them which made my STHR [stops per hour] go up and he told his boss he did not help me. I have customers that remember both uniforms holding boxes and walking towards their doors. That means he helped when he said he did not .
His boss and his boss did not and still don’t believe me. I have plenty of recordings like this that does sugest that the management in this district don’t like me because I cant preform 15.78 STHR when I am doing the job by myself. I was elevated to this 15.78 STHR with the help from C. B. [the boss]. He helped me 6 of 6 times which gave me a higher STHR.
In the code of business conduct UPS talks about ESSENTIALS: reputation, honesty, quality, and integrity. Dishonest dealings will and have undermined our reputation and integrity. The code talks about failure to comply with the provisions will not be tolerated. Ethical responsibilities have been violated by the supervisors. Irregardless on what they say they will put the blame all on me. Code also says regardless of his or her position. Ethical responsibilities and legal were violated using retaliation and dishonesty.
Would like you to know about my health background? 1994 - open heart; 1997 - colon and large intestine removed; 1998 - stroke [tia]; 2001 - five vertibrae smashed. And the only thing the boss can say [Kris Donkers] - “Maybe this job is not for you.” All it took is to take a look at what happened to me and to make the right decision, not to use retribution and dishonesty.
United Parcel Service - look what they have done to me!
The behaviors of the supervisors were deliberate and intended to defraud and deceive the state panel. These were not “honest errors” - it was deliberately done through willful deceit, personal financial gain, and no moral character to tell the truth. I have never lied to any parties involved in any case - that is moral character. Why cant they do the same and tell the truth before they are put in prison for breaking civil rights laws?
Over the last 18 months of the 15 years I have worked for UPS, the bosses in my building have accused and punished me more severely than other workers accused of the same violations. The reason for this treatment is for filling out multiple grievances on the same supervisors in the building. They brought up facts that were worded so it looked like I was on a downward spiral. The fact was that a grievance I brought up and turned in on due consideration to the physical condition of employee. I have had several operations the have limited how fast I can do the job; that in no way tells anybody I cannot do the job. The company discriminated against me for that reason of that grievance and others that I filed on my physical condition. They have been dishonest to all the federal agencies that I have contacted about this in fact. They give a different story to each agency that I have told the same facts to. My story never will change.
By deception these supervisors have put a very large strain on my emotional, financial, personal and physical well-being that I will never get back. Too much damage has been inflicted and too much destructive suffering due to the supervisors, who with willful disregard discriminated against me for the purpose of getting one more box off that truck every hour to make their numbers look better. How many lies and dishonest statements will they submit to keep this discrimination out of the court system and under the rug? I can’t stop thinking of what they had to do to keep my recordings from being heard at that state panel. I was lied to one too many times, so I went and bought a recorder and started to tape every time they had me in the office. Lie after lie, they continued to get larger and larger. When they were told about the tapes the company circled the trucks and started the dishonesty/discrimination spin. None that they do so professionally with out stopping. They have no moral character to do what is right and what is the law.
To: C.E.O. and board of directors - UNITED PARCEL SERVICE
As I look into the future all I see is despair - unconscionable depression for the act of willful infliction of mental anguish with no site of equitable relief for unearned, dishonest promotions. The longer I look at this and the more people (customers) see this unchecked attitude at the management that willingly participated in these willful acts, the harder it will be for the board of directors to operate this company. Not getting your own people that do the work behind you creates cracks in the foundation of the solid theory of the founder.
Unless the original theory all along was total power of the entire employee - 24 hours a day - what they do at home, leisure, with their families, and what they eat, sleep and talk about. That sounds like the corporate strategy of a social Republic, or communism. These thoughts of total control suppresses the thought amongst a free society that enabled this entire company to flourish to become the largest delivery company in the world.
It is not what you own or buy - it is what you are. I want you to realize what it is to wake up one day and discover that a monster told a bunch of lies and `poof` - you are a never been. Everything I wanted to be I was doing. It is what I was working 15 years for evolving into me. When a computer came up with the unreachable numbers I could not reach due to pre-existing health conditions and instead of human compassion and contact to each individual to see what that person can do to the best of their ability. Why would I make the unreachable numbers only six times in the boss was with me reason: he helped me and was fired for his dishonesty.
JOHN DRUMM
01/17/2008
To the United Parcel Service board of director’s personnel: it is my responsibility to let you know that what is going on in the Akron, Ohio building is not what Jim Casey had imagined when he started his company. This is a factual chain of events that has occurred in the one place, that by all standards and passed events in company history that should have never happened to any employee at this company. United Parcel Service has set the standards to every company wants to strive for, and wanting to be at the top of their profession and industry. The chain of events that I will get into are completely counter-productive to what the board of directors have put in place to all adhere to at United Parcel Service.
This counter-productive process that the management at the Akron, Ohio building has put me and others through has had profoundly devastatingly effects to me and my family, and to all of the people I worked with at UPS. Even if you worked at the headquarters as a supervisor or as a driver or part timer at the smallest building in the company. The code of conduct that is written and the result as it is enforced is entirely on two different worlds as to the board of directors has intended the code to be enforced.
The dishonesty that the management has done to me and the company is permanent, and the corruptive part of the crumbling of this company’s foundation. These scenarios, that in all aspects that I have done these indignities to the company are false, and came from the management and my immediate supervisors that are in charge at our building. Collectively, by design, they have their paperwork perfectly written to show that I was completely at fault.
Misleading letters that do not show the facts in the case led me to be terminated from a company that I spent my entire adult life working for proudly. The following of every part of the code of conduct and contract did not achieve any different changes to the fact that the management changes what is written in the code of conduct at their leisure. In that code and contract without any limits to which the local management adhere to - these misguided individuals.
This corruption that is at the foundation of this company will destroy any programs or strategies that the board of directors will deploy to make or [try] to continue the great expansion this company enjoyed over the years of hard work of from all employees. If the problem is not isolated and the perpetrators removed from power at the lowest level of management, all corners of this companies foundation will implode and there will be nothing left but a bunch of brown piles of rubble.
Not even the people that have 40 years to the people that have one day of service want this to happen. The people that don’t even like the company at all would not like to see the employees of a large company to be out at a job, because of a handful of management could not tell the truth to their boss that a person[me] that works for them physically can’t go any faster. Especially when that person [me] has had as many major operations as I have had and has one of the lowest call-off records in the building do not take their word for it. They are trying to handle it from the inside of their confines and get others to go along with their program. That in their minds is right and to keep the truth hidden from the people that do not want the company to be corrupt [board of directors].
Change is needed to continue to succeed, to be and stay at the 5% of companies that make a very good profit and keep a good public image that UPS has sustained for nearly 100 years. Don’t let a handful of corrupted, misguided, dishonest, inhumane supervisors continue to do this kind of business that has destroyed every thing I have worked for and waited to come back from, every operation that I have went through and to be treated the way that I was. Every operation that I’ve had to encounter 4 words that always came up before, during, after operations: live, back to work.
I do not know when the board of directors meet for regular business meetings or to discuss the future business ventures. With the patience that I have I will wait for a reply to this letter that I have written and I will try to get to as many board members as I can. This letter and other letters will be better handled from inside the company rather than showing it to others that will interpret what happened entirely different from the facts and can get exaggerated, to look like the problem is widespread throughout the company and the perception. The board has the power and the opportunity to do what is right and to undo what those certain individuals [supervisors] have done to the integrity of the company and to me and my family, and matter in their file is not sufficient enough for satisfactory results. United Parcel Service is one of the few hundred year companies that will be suffocated by a small few and crumble.
The indignities of what those supervisors have done to me cannot be put into words, I have worked and worked as hard as my body could physically handle and that was never good enough with the numbers that were irregular on daily basis and the supervisors took pleasure in the pain they inflicted. This should be an isolated incident for a company that does this much business with so many different companies, individuals and a wide variety of industries, but working for this company for 15 years the people from the inside know that this is more than I isolated incident is started to be a widespread problem which needs immediate, strategic and honest approach to stop the infection at a small few who have the power over others day in and day out in the power to ruin people’s lives like they have mine.
John,
What you described happens everywhere within this UPS culture especially in the South!