Okay, I know it's a German courier company, but do they have to bring the
sturm und drang with each package delivered (or not delivered, as the case may be). I ordered a dozen months of roses from the Hippie Dippie company
Organic Bouquet. They have an affiliate program with my
Hippie Dippie long distance phone company. Yeah, so I get an email that the flowers for Mommy Awesome have shipped. I check out the tracking late in the morning and see that they've been delivered. I call Mommy Awesome, and she says, "Uh.... No, they haven't. We've been home all day, and goose egg." I call DHL and report that something wacky is going, and that the online tracking sheet says it's been sent to... S. 14th street?? I'm not going to tell you all where I live, but I'll let you know that it's really far from S. 14th street. I call up, I'm crying because I'm talking to a boy on the phone and know how to cry on cue, and I'm more likely to get results if I cry than if I shout. Also, I'm actually pretty upset, so it wasn't that hard to work up some waterworks, you know? The guy lets me know that a specialist has been assigned to my case, and that this person will get back to me within two hours.
About an hour and forty-five minutes pass, and this no-nonsense broad calls up. She tells me that they contacted the driver, and he is adamant that he delivered the flowers to the correct place. NO! He didn't. They're nowhere on my mother's property, and there's no note affixed to the door, and there's nothing! She promises she'll call the dispatcher and get back to me in an hour. She doesn't.
I call about two hours later, and I'm okay and holding it together. But then I hear their pitchy spiel over Christmas music, and I lose it. I'm hysterical, sobbing in earnest, blood vessels in my face bursting. This is not pretty crying, okay? I hear about DHL's reliability, how they put their customers first, and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah WAAAAHHHHHHHHHH. I get through, and I'm able to let the lady on the line know what's what between sobs. I feel like a shitheel, because it's not her fault, but then I feel like less of a dick when she tells me the same info about how the driver is not budging and says he delivered to the right place, he merely entered the wrong address on his little machine doohickey. I explain to her that my parents have been home the whole day! They didn't hear a doorbell ring, and they couldn't find anything near the front porch. She suggests that perhaps someone stole the flowers off our porch...? No! They live in a nice neighborhood, but the only 14th street in Miami I can think of is the Beach, which is about an hour away from my parents' house. It's the same street my favorite sandwich stand, La Sandwicherie, is on, but it's also the same street the Deuce is on, which I'm sure you know about if you've ever watched an episode of Miami Vice or read 100 Bullets. Maybe a Minuteman made off with my flowers?
Yeah, so they tracked down the dispatcher and the driver, and the driver was informed that he was not to go home without at least stopping by our place. We gave DHL directions to our house, since he apparently had trouble finding it the first time around.
About an hour ago, my mom steps out and, SURPRISE! Flowers on the doorstep. I don't know if the person whose house they were delivered to brought them, or if the DHL guy was just too ashamed to ring the doorbell and face us. I suspect it's the latter.
I think I handled it okay, all things considered. It's my mom's Christmas gift. It's important to me. I should note that the flowers are in not so great condition. The little water sock thingies, two of them, popped off and soaked the flowers. Also, they may have been out in the heat all day long, so that might be another reason why they don't look so hot. We called DHL, and let them know that we finally got the flowers. They waived the shipping charges. I had also left messages on Organic Bouquet's voicemail, and a nice lady from their contacted me less than five minutes after we discovered the flowers. She was a very nice lady, and my mom's getting two dozen Magestic Sunset roses out of the deal.
Sigh. I could talk about the issues I've been having with DHL at work, but I'm all ranted out.
