FedEx: Federal Express or Fed-up Expecting? (updated)

A puzzle: how many days does it take FedEx to ship a pen from Shanghai to Paris in two days?

Gotcha! In two days FedEx can deliver a pen from China to UK, from Shanghai to Berlin, or to Vilnius, or to.. Atlantis! But not to Paris.

So, the correct answer is – four days: one – to ship it from China to Paris and another three for local delivery attempts to the same correct address. If you don’t believe me, you can always ask my girlfriend – she’s having fun with them today all-day-long as she ordered a really cool Wireless Laser Pointer which should’ve been already delivered earlier today. Now it’s 22:00 and it’s not here! Check out the tracking report (click on the picture to change scale):

I can imagine this guy going back and forth, always returning at the same wrong door, knocking every few minutes and asking: are you sure, this is not your address? No? Are you sure? Common..

Funny thing is – my girl was tracking the status quite actively and once she noticed the first failed delivery, she immediately contacted FedEx to clear it up: the address FedEx has was actually correct, they were only missing code to our tower block electronic lock and so she gave FedEx the code. I should note that as most of Parisians, we have a house keeper working 9 to 5 here who takes care of lost guys like this one.

Anyway, pointer’s not here yet, but.. guess what we found in the mailbox later today:

Mailbox is inside the building, so he only needed to get on the second floor and pull our door rope (we were home all day).

Dear FedEx, I know it’s not you. I just wish you to find some better partners here in Paris. You should try making friends with Paris Firemen. They’re really good!

I really miss Vilnius..

UPDATE: The next day, my girl called FedEx again. I couldn’t stop laughing:

• At first, FedEx Smarty asked for a cellphone number saying they got it wrong on the cover letter. My girlfriend asked the number they have on the cover letter and.. they matched. Well, I understand – it should be really hard for an international company to get the international phone numeration, especially that with “+” symbol in front.
• Then they found one more excuse: “The address we have is incorrect. Well, no, actually, address is correct, but the messenger got it wrong, he got the house number as 7, not as 97″. First, I can’t really imagine messenger going four times to the same 7th house, not finding the addressee and not taking a deeper look at cover letter (when it was finally delivered, I’ve checked – there were three copies of cover letter enclosed – all with correct props.). And last, but totally not least – how can messenger, going to the 7th house accidentally drop an undelivery note in a mailbox located in house nr. 97?

Anyway, we finally received it. You might want to take a look how funny the delivery report is – notice how many hours did the gadget spent traveling from China to France and from Paris to Paris: