I was pretty psyched to finally see FedEx as an option for shipping. We prefer USPS and UPS but sometimes FedEx is the right choice. What I don’t understand is why there is no option to schedule a FedEx pick-up like there is for UPS. No problem. I’ll just create a separate FedEx account, login and create my pick-ups there.
When I did that, I found it incredibly difficult to find out what the charges were for them to pick up my package(s). I finally found a page that showed it to be $4, just like UPS. Oh, and after creating my business account, I got 3 calls from people at FedEx offering help for anything I needed. How nice I thought.
Then after the 4th time using the pick-up service on my FedEx account, I get a text from Capital One alerting me to a possible fraudulent charge of $24.95. The charge wasn’t even listed as FedEx. I couldn’t figure out what the charge was because there was no company name associated with the charge. One of the places I checked before having Capital One cancel my business card and send me a new one was FedEx. FOUND IT!
FedEx was charging me $24.95 for each pickup! $24.95!! FedEx drives by my business at least 5 times a day, but they are charging me $24.95 to stop and pick up a package! So I cancelled the pick up. Guess what? They still charged me the $24.95 and now I am fighting with them not to steal my money. Oh, and I’ve been trying now for 3 days to cancel my account. It would be easier for me to get blood from a stone because nobody there can help me cancel my account.
Sorry for the long post, but I just wanted to give a heads up about FedEx and how they plan to overcharge and steal from honest Shopify merchants. Oh, and Shopify…..Why is there no option on your platform to set up FedEx pickups like there is for UPS?
That sounds like an absolute nightmare from start to finish. Thank you so much for taking the time to share this experience and warn other merchants. Dealing with surprise charges and a customer service runaround like that is incredibly stressful and completely unacceptable.
To answer your question about why FedEx pickups are not integrated into Shopify like they are for UPS, it comes down to the level of partnership between the carriers and the platform. Shopify’s integration with UPS is much deeper and more mature, which allows for advanced features like built-in pickup scheduling directly from the admin. The integration with FedEx is newer and, at the moment, is more focused on the core service of providing rates and generating labels, without those extra logistical features.
Thanks for the response PieLab. The UPS integration used to be great, but for some reason Shopify removed the “on call” scheduling of UPS pickups, which allowed us to schedule a same day pickup if you did it before 11am. I actually spoke with the UPS manager that handles the Shopify account and he told me that UPS absolutely did NOT remove that. That feature was removed by Shopify and he didn’t even know it was no longer offered. He told me that he was going to contact Shopify and get it put back, but he never got back to me. That was about 3 years ago.
I have a workaround to that “on call” feature that I won’t share publicly, but if anyone contacts me privately, I will share it. I’ve been using my workaround for years and I’m afraid that if I share it publicly, Shopify will find a way to stop it too.
That’s really frustrating, Cary. Thanks for sharing your experience — most of us would assume that FedEx pickup costs are similar to those of UPS. $24.95 per pickup is definitely unreasonable, especially for a business customer. Shopify really should add a built-in FedEx pickup option to avoid all this confusion.