One of my colleagues, Diane Tunick Morello, points out that Amazon.com offered free shipping during the holidays but then spoiled it by turning cartons over to the U.S. Postal Service rather than UPS. As Diane puts it, she'd rather pay for the UPS shipping charge and know that the item will get to her on time. She also believes that companies such as Amazon are big enough now to offer their loyal customers deals, but they don't.
Now, I recognize that shipping and handling are vague, but e-businesses need to recognize that we consumers are smart. We send out our own mail, so we know what it costs to send a 14.6-ounce package. Some of us shop on the Web so we can get the best price, and we don't want bogus fees interfering with that. It jjust doesn't make sense that some things seem to cost so much more to ship than others.
E-businesses should not dupe their customers by tacking on empty charges unless they want to lose business. You can't make up the losses you incur by running your business badly with shipping and handling charges, although I'm sure some folks sit around and scheme about it. Equally heinous is the crime of putting small merchandise in a big box so we think it must have cost a lot to ship. We're not going to fall for that either. Some reason has to apply here, and when it costs less to ship a carpet cleaner than a couple of tubes of lipstick, something just isn't right.
