I had to have a rebate form for Home Depot postmarked by Sept 10. Anyone with a calendar can see that this is a Sunday - post office open? No. So I turned to the internet. First I went to the USPS site to buy postage. This worked out well for me until the computer froze every time I tried to print the postage label. (Apparently this is a common problem).
Next, I turned to UPS. I bought my postage (ground) and sent the item out on Monday Sept 11 through a UPS authorized dealer. They basically gave me an envelope and clear sleeve for my UPS label and charged me 53 cents.
Yesterday, September 21 (the day I'm pretty sure my rebate form was supposed to be received by Home Depot), I received a letter from UPS telling me that they made an "address correction" and they charged my credit card an additional $5.
The item I sent was supposed to go to Arizona. They decided that since it was addressed to a P.O. Box, and they don't deliver to P.O. Boxes, they would look up the first line of the address (which WAS NOT the actual company name) and they found a matching name in MARYLAND, and decided that was where the package was supposed to go. Because obviously ARIZONA and MARYLAND are the same place.
Did they contact me before they made this assumption to tell me "Hey, we don't deliver to P.O. Boxes, could you possibly get us a physical address?" No, they didn't. Do they have safeguards in place on their website that automatically reject P.O. Boxes in their "ship to" address line? Nope. They do, however, have an address "auto-correct" feature which supposedly updates the zip code if it doesn't match what they have in their system. Still doesn't reject the P.O. Box though.
They think they caught the driver before he dropped off the package at some unknown company in Maryland. Now I guess it will be on its way back to Arizona. And Home Depot will get it after the stated deadline. And I won't get my rebate. Maybe after I call Home Depot and explain they will understand and sympathize or maybe I'll soon be writing a report about them too.
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