Freaking Dimweight!

[Eric]

I spent almost three hours this afternoon very carefully preparing and boxing up two large, relatively heavy and fragile bits of electronics in a box to ship. When I got done, I had a 72-pound package, in a 34"X24"x24" box. The shipping for UPS and FedEx Ground service was around $150, to go about 170 miles!!! So, I undid all my careful packaging and repackaged the damned things in two boxes, with a combined volume AND weight that was greater than the single package. Yet, the shipping  for each of the two packages is only $21, more than $100 less then shipping them in the single box. So, they are going to take up more space on the truck, make the truck use a little more fuel, to satisfy their stupid dimweight model. I understand what dimweight is and why it is, but in many cases, it is just plain stupid.

[Maser]

That's the beauty of always keeping lots of disposable income on hand.  Pay someone else to deal with the bullshit! 

[minervadoe]

5 hours ago, Eric said:

I understand what dimweight is and why it is, but in many cases, it is just plain stupid.

Dim weight is the amount of space a package occupies in relation to its actual weight. For each shipment, you are charged based on the dimensional weight or actual weight of the package—whichever is greater.

But, is there a correlation to a similarly spelled word:

dimwit       ---   dĭm′wĭt″

noun

1. A stupid person.
2. A person who is deficient in intelligence.
3. a stupid incompetent person

[railfancwb]

Some trucks max out their load by weight - crushed rock for example. Others max out by volume - potato chips. 

[Mrs.Cicero]

I wonder if that has anything to do with the allowable lift weights for the deliverymen.  I know we weren't allowed to pack boxes heavier than 55# for Fedex or UPS when I was shipping books, because the deliverymen weren't supposed to lift anything heavier than that (they said).

[Eric]

26 minutes ago, Mrs.Cicero said:

I wonder if that has anything to do with the allowable lift weights for the deliverymen.  I know we weren't allowed to pack boxes heavier than 55# for Fedex or UPS when I was shipping books, because the deliverymen weren't supposed to lift anything heavier than that (they said).

They allow the package to be as heavy as 150 pounds. I’ve shipped some very heavy smaller packages and the rates weren’t bad. They don’t like big boxes. I understand that there is only so much room in the trailers, but a system that pushes the shipper to send two packages that fill an even greater volume doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. I imagine that their shipping model works most of the time, but it ought to have more flexibility built into it.