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Fedex is NOT getting a Christmas card this year (Sig Solar order destroyed)

To be fair to SS and Fed-X I recently ordered new panels from two places.. one of the orders was from SS …and both were deliver by Fed-X ..

The first Order was deliver 2-3 at a time .. free shipping… no problems …

The SS solar order was sent by truck with a lift gate…

The rep at SS was professional , knowledgeable and extremely helpful in making the Order .
Since it wasn’t a full pallet , we worked out an agreeable deal on time , shipping and payment .I am fixing to order some Victron stuff and other gear from him soon…

It showed up on time ina good size Fed-X truck…about 850 lbs…on a pallet with the panels verticle…well secured and properly strapped…

We didn’t have a fork lift so the driver and I slowly walked the the pallet to the lift gate…
( slowly) ….
We tailgate lowered it to the ground , tipped it over and layed it down …the panels looked great , I cut the straps to make them lay even and he left…
He and Fed-X did an excellent job… the next day I broke the parcel apart and moved them one by one to my work area...
I checked them for damage and tested the VOC on all of them….all were fine…
I’m building the frames for them now.. they are all excellent so far as In know…… I ordered a couple of extra justbin case…

I will be the first to commend for both SS and Fed-X for a great job…

I don’t like to broadly paint a bad picture of anyone’s business …it’s a tough world we operate in..

With that said , I had a good experience… that’s why I called SS afterwards and thanked them.

If I hadn’t got good service I would be bitchin at em…

Maybe I’m just lucky, I never seem to have a problem buying stuff online.

Very rarely ….

J.
 
I've only had one delivery from Fed Ex freight. It was a server rack and 6 Ruixu batteries. It weighed ~900 pounds total. It came in perfect condition. It was like it just rolled off the Ruixu factory floor directly into my garage. I was impressed. But mostly because the Ruixu packaging was superb. Double boxed with with thick formed foam and tied down to a pallet. It was packaged so well that if it fell off the back of a truck on a highway it would probably survive.

I had another delivery from some other freight company, I forgot the name. It was a pallet of solar panels from Santan Solar. When it arrived, it looked like something heavy was stacked on top of it. You can see a retangular indentation on top. When I opend it up, two of the top panels were smashed. I took pictures, wrote on the BOL that top panels were destroyed and that other panels were not inspected but will be notified later if damage is found. Yes, you can write that on the BOL. I also took a picture of the BOL to prove that's what I wrote and signed. Then I emailed Santan Solar right away. Everything was taken care of easily. No hassles at all. A day later when I had time, I looked through the other panels and no other damage was found.
 
The inverter really should have been shipped separately. I get that they are trying to save money by bundling everything together with the freight carrier. But the inverter would have done a lot better by FedEx ground or UPS instead of freight. By the pictures, something really big and heavy must have landed on top of the inverter, which then pushed against the panels and shattered them.
 
That looks brutal your heart must have sank when you opened everything up, we tend to record opening every parcel here and surprisingly had very few issues which is strange considering a lot of parcels are delivered similar to thisthai-motorcycle-delivery-rider-boxes-galore-on-his-bike-v0-h192v3wlw7eb1.jpg
My panels were delivered on the back of a pickup stored vertically with no padding or straps but luckily came intact.
Generally I hate buying anything fragile but the delivery guys know us well, not sure if they like us or not once again due to dog food the wife generally buys 20 or more 20kg bags when it's on sale, hard to forget someone who orders nearly half a metric ton of kibble.
 
I agreed to let Current Connected (which has been great to deal with) ship my recent order via Fedex because I'm not in a hurry to receive it, for once. Initial estimate was for arrival today, more than a week after CC handed it over to them, but then the emailed update said yesterday. Sure enough, late in the day I get a call saying they want to set up delivery, for NEXT week. I absolutely hate it when I see a retailer ship through them.
 
I usually don't have problems with any carrier (though I haven't had them ship freight to me before). I have had issues with both UPS and FedEx in the past. Seems to depend on location, really. The UPS delivery guy I have now is totally awesome. Fedex is, well, depends on whether it is Cool Dude or The Goon, although I haven't seen The Goon as much lately so maybe the weird troubles are over.
 
SparkyJJO said:
I usually don't have problems with any carrier (though I haven't had them ship freight to me before). I have had issues with both UPS and FedEx in the past. Seems to depend on location, really. The UPS delivery guy I have now is totally awesome. Fedex is, well, depends on whether it is Cool Dude or The Goon, although I haven't seen The Goon as much lately so maybe the weird troubles are over.
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No Prob…..if your Fed -X goon is missing ….I have one here ….…I will be glad to lend him to ya ..OR you can just keep him….. NO CHARGE ….
 
My 57 panels were delivered a couple weeks ago via a different company but came from signature solar. I ordered 1 spare panel. Came as a pallet of 36 and a partial of 21. The full pallet had the bottom panels cracked and the partial(standing on sides) had one panel cracked. Looks like it got poked by a fork or something in the center.

I didn’t check them as they showed up as the packaging looked pretty good and that would take a while. Bad choice. I may order more and this time I will make the driver wait.

Signature solar did a great job of wrapping them.

Just opened them and probably too late to do anything about it.

I sold two Multiplus 5000s recently and shipped them via ups. Packaged as they came in factory boxes with plenty of foam. The buy sent me pics of them dented. 😩

Ridiculous!
 

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I like how the panels can make it all the way over here from China.. but once they get into our hands, they get destroyed in the final mile. There has to be a better way to deliver panels. It's shameful because of the waste.
 
As a westerner now living in the east I think it's down to responsibility, so much is insured for us in the west that we don't tend to worry anymore "ops my bad, don't worry insurance will cover it" must get said how my times a day?
Not saying it's not the same for people here in Asia but many people can't even afford insurance so they tend to take more care. I get far less damaged items from a Thai man delivering from a motorcycle sidecar than an American FedEx driver in his fancy box truck that it has to be down to more than how well something is packaged/shipped.
 
ThaiTaffy said:
As a westerner now living in the east I think it's down to responsibility, so much is insured for us in the west that we don't tend to worry anymore "ops my bad, don't worry insurance will cover it" must get said how my times a day?
Not saying it's not the same for people here in Asia but many people can't even afford insurance so they tend to take more care. I get far less damaged items from a Thai man delivering from a motorcycle sidecar than an American FedEx driver in his fancy box truck that it has to be down to more than how well something is packaged/shipped.
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I think it's about pride in one's work. Whether you're a garbage man, mailman, teacher, or a lawyer, if you don't have pride in your work whatever comes out is just crap. It seems more and more people only care about their paycheck and throw pride out the window.
 
JWLV said:
I think it's about pride in one's work. Whether you're a garbage man, mailman, teacher, or a lawyer, if you don't have pride in your work whatever comes out is just crap. It seems more and more people only want their weekly paycheck and throw pride out the window.
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Not sure, here I don't tend to see pride on ones work at all, more pride in the paycheck.
Maybe I'm wrong it's very much monkey see monkey do here, they try to copy building styles or technology without understanding the finer details or engineering behind it.
A good example is the concrete supplier not far from me, they have seen that concrete trucks can be cleaned with a small jackhammer so now they don't bother washing out the trucks after a pour and just chip it out every 2-3 days. If they were given fancy delivery trucks with hydraulic tailgates like in the west you can bet there would be far more issues than them just offloading by hand from a pickup truck.
 
Hopefully my experience with FEDEX will be different. I ordered six 550 watt PERC panels from SunGoldPower. FEDEX delivered the panels with damage. There are two panels per box with the panel faces together separated by foam and the back/frame face out in the box.
The top box had what was clearly forklift pallet fork/tine damage as the frame was significantly bent and a portion of the box peeled back. The panel in the bottom box also frame damage. The glass on both panels is intact with no spiderweb cracks and the panels at least produced VOC when tested with a multimeter.

Got off the phone with FEDEX (gal was very professional and polite) who provided me a picture of the shipment on the SunGoldPower loading dock prior to loading, clearly no damage.

I provided a dozen pictures of the delivery as it sat in my front yard. Hopefully FEDEX will make this right and reimburse me the cost of the two panels. SunGoldPower has also offered compensation and a "deal" on a future purchase.

FEDEX can pick up the damaged panels if they want or let me keep them. I suspect they will work fine, just don't know if any seal was compromised by the frame damage that will result in moisture intrusion several years down the road.

I will keep my fingers crossed.
 
marionw said:
Hopefully my experience with FEDEX will be different. I ordered six 550 watt PERC panels from SunGoldPower. FEDEX delivered the panels with damage. There are two panels per box with the panel faces together separated by foam and the back/frame face out in the box.
The top box had what was clearly forklift pallet fork/tine damage as the frame was significantly bent and a portion of the box peeled back. The panel in the bottom box also frame damage. The glass on both panels is intact with no spiderweb cracks and the panels at least produced VOC when tested with a multimeter.

Got off the phone with FEDEX (gal was very professional and polite) who provided me a picture of the shipment on the SunGoldPower loading dock prior to loading, clearly no damage.

I provided a dozen pictures of the delivery as it sat in my front yard. Hopefully FEDEX will make this right and reimburse me the cost of the two panels. SunGoldPower has also offered compensation and a "deal" on a future purchase.

FEDEX can pick up the damaged panels if they want or let me keep them. I suspect they will work fine, just don't know if any seal was compromised by the frame damage that will result in moisture intrusion several years down the road.

I will keep my fingers crossed.
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This sounds very atypical.

It's been my experience that the shipper only has obligation to the contracting party. Did you personally arrange the shipment via Fedex from SunGOldPower and pay Fedex or provide your own account number, or did SGP? If SGP contracted with Fedex, Fedex is only obligated to them.

Our company ships a LOT via Fedex, and it's always our issue UNLESS we ship via a customer supplied account number therein making the customer the contracting party.
 
sunshine_eggo said:
This sounds very atypical.

It's been my experience that the shipper only has obligation to the contracting party. Did you personally arrange the shipment via Fedex from SunGOldPower and pay Fedex or provide your own account number, or did SGP? If SGP contracted with Fedex, Fedex is only obligated to them.

Our company ships a LOT via Fedex, and it's always our issue UNLESS we ship via a customer supplied account number therein making the customer the contracting party.
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SunGoldPower arranged shipment. FEDEX has cameras mounted on the rear of their trailers and have the pictures of the pickup and the delivery. As I said, I can only hope but I will push this to some conclusion. What that conclusion is remains to be seen. It is clear that FEDEX caused the damage to at least the top panel.
 
marionw said:
SunGoldPower arranged shipment. FEDEX has cameras mounted on the rear of their trailers and have the pictures of the pickup and the delivery. As I said, I can only hope but I will push this to some conclusion. What that conclusion is remains to be seen. It is clear that FEDEX caused the damage to at least the top panel.
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Anything is possible from my experience…
Charleston SC…

A 6.5 ft solid bronze 1.25 inch prop shaft with reverse threading was special ordered for my bent one… on the boat..
it was shipped Fed X “OVERNIGHT “ to the boat yard where the boat was lifted and chocked on land ( 40ish ft boat) with installation crew waiting for the FedX truck…next morn ..150 bucks per hour once the crew shows up to drink coffee and wait.

NO FedX truck shows by noon……it was due by 9 or 10 ish…A.M.

I called FedX …they said it was lost …they couldn’t find it…sry….

WHAATTT…?

After woke up from my fainting event…I paid the mechanic guys for 3 hours for waiting and sent them away…450.00…

As it turned out the next day FedX called me and said they had found the shaft…unboxed …

BUT……..it was pretty damaged on the threaded part on the end …..

WHATTTTTT.? How is any of this even possible…?

Well here’s how…

When at the FedX transfer station during shipping , a worker grabbed the narrow shipping tube under his arm and jumped on a child’s bike that was in the loading area and started chasing the other guys around acting like he had a lance or spear ..well two others grabbed brooms and started poking back at him…
A freaking mid-evil jousting session…with my boat shaft…at 2 am in a FedX warehouse..

The jabbing back and forth threw it against the end inside of the tube , busted a hole in it and sent the shaft bouncing down the “Steel stairwell”…..

It boogered the threads up awful he said…..he asked if I still wanted it delivered..
I said NO…

In their mind I guess the workers figured if they hide it behind a big door and threw away the shipping tube , no one would notice or maybe not even find out about it being missing…🤔..hmmm…great plan….
And these are grown ass men with this idea..!!

in the end the company in VA made a new shaft , shipped it out, I got it installed..

I think the company was paid by fed X for replacing it and shipping it again…not sure…!

I didn’t have to pay anything further except repaying the mechanics another 450.00.
Ouch….

Untill you get yer stuff in hand , and see that it works , nothing is ever for sure…

J.
 
JRH said:
Anything is possible from my experience…
Charleston SC…

A 6.5 ft solid bronze 1.25 inch prop shaft with reverse threading was special ordered for my bent one… on the boat..
it was shipped Fed X “OVERNIGHT “ to the boat yard where the boat was lifted and chocked on land ( 40ish ft boat) with installation crew waiting for the FedX truck…next morn ..150 bucks per hour once the crew shows up to drink coffee and wait.

NO FedX truck shows by noon……it was due by 9 or 10 ish…A.M.

I called FedX …they said it was lost …they couldn’t find it…sry….

WHAATTT…?

After woke up from my fainting event…I paid the mechanic guys for 3 hours for waiting and sent them away…450.00…

As it turned out the next day FedX called me and said they had found the shaft…unboxed …

BUT……..it was pretty damaged on the threaded part on the end …..

WHATTTTTT.? How is any of this even possible…?

Well here’s how…

When at the FedX transfer station during shipping , a worker grabbed the narrow shipping tube under his arm and jumped on a child’s bike that was in the loading area and started chasing the other guys around acting like he had a lance or spear ..well two others grabbed brooms and started poking back at him…
A freaking mid-evil jousting session…with my boat shaft…at 2 am in a FedX warehouse..

The jabbing back and forth threw it against the end inside of the tube , busted a hole in it and sent the shaft bouncing down the “Steel stairwell”…..

It boogered the threads up awful he said…..he asked if I still wanted it delivered..
I said NO…

In their mind I guess the workers figured if they hide it behind a big door and threw away the shipping tube , no one would notice or maybe not even find out about it being missing…🤔..hmmm…great plan….
And these are grown ass men with this idea..!!

in the end the company in VA made a new shaft , shipped it out, I got it installed..

I think the company was paid by fed X for replacing it and shipping it again…not sure…!

I didn’t have to pay anything further except repaying the mechanics another 450.00.
Ouch….

Untill you get yer stuff in hand , and see that it works , nothing is ever for sure…

J.
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Until I am made whole... Document everything and keep all records. I did send SunGoldPower the undamaged picture of the panels before loading at SunGoldPower. The Bill Of Lading also stated "DO NOT PUT OTHER FRT ON TOP". The question is; will SunGoldPower go after FEDEX then make me whole. We shall see..
 
marionw said:
Until I am made whole... Document everything and keep all records. I did send SunGoldPower the undamaged picture of the panels before loading at SunGoldPower. The Bill Of Lading also stated "DO NOT PUT OTHER FRT ON TOP". The question is; will SunGoldPower go after FEDEX then make me whole. We shall see..
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That's usually how it works, and SGP should feel obligated to do so, or they should be avoided like the plague.
 
OK, got my pallet of Hyperion panels from Signature Solar via Fedex Freight, and thought I should update this thread with my experience.

Working with Fedex was a mixed bag. They were supposed to deliver the shipment on Monday between 2-4PM; they called and asked if they could do it earlier and I said fine. Then they never showed on Monday. Calling after hours, and talking with several Fedex offices; it seems the driver tried coming up an old dirt mining road with a 30% grade and a couple of hairpin turns; They gave up, turned around and left the pallet in will call. Never called me. Guess the driver did not think the "No Trucks" sign at the bottom of that road applied to them.

Anyhow I convinced the dispatcher that there are three other ways into my town, all which take regular truck traffic, and they rescheduled for the next day. New driver was great, showed up on time, we worked to get that pallet (~2000lbs) up the incline of my driveway onto the lift gate with some come-alongs. And the pallet got delivered. Box and pallet were in very good shape, some tiny scrapes/tears on the plastic wrap and cardboard, but no shipping damage that I could see on any of the panels. All in all a great experience, if you ignore that first no-show on Monday.

And some comments on the panels themselves: These Hyperions are quite impressive. Have not tested them electrically, but the mechanical fit and finish are very nice. And they are quite sturdy, not wavy as the OP questioned about his panels. Might be that these have 2mm glass on front and back, as opposed to the 1.6mm glass of some others. I realize that this flex or lack thereof may not be a good indication of wind and hail survivability, and only real word testing will tell, but it does give some reassurance.

My only concern is there are two short (like 2" long) scratches on the front glass of one panel. Not very deep, barely deep enough to catch a finger nail on, but a scratch in the glass nonetheless. This was on a middle panel in the stack, and runs in a direction that would indicate it could not have come from our moving the panels off the stack. I am guessing it happened during manufacturing or the palletizing of the panels. I fully expect this panel will work OK now, but am concerned the scratches will compromise its hail and wind performance. Need to chat with Signature Solar about this, but really one possible dud out of a full pallet of 36 ain't bad.

So for what it's worth, that's my story on the panels and Fedex. HTH someone.
 
Steve777 said:
OK, got my pallet of Hyperion panels from Signature Solar via Fedex Freight, and thought I should update this thread with my experience.

Working with Fedex was a mixed bag. They were supposed to deliver the shipment on Monday between 2-4PM; they called and asked if they could do it earlier and I said fine. Then they never showed on Monday. Calling after hours, and talking with several Fedex offices; it seems the driver tried coming up an old dirt mining road with a 30% grade and a couple of hairpin turns; They gave up, turned around and left the pallet in will call. Never called me. Guess the driver did not think the "No Trucks" sign at the bottom of that road applied to them.

Anyhow I convinced the dispatcher that there are three other ways into my town, all which take regular truck traffic, and they rescheduled for the next day. New driver was great, showed up on time, we worked to get that pallet (~2000lbs) up the incline of my driveway onto the lift gate with some come-alongs. And the pallet got delivered. Box and pallet were in very good shape, some tiny scrapes/tears on the plastic wrap and cardboard, but no shipping damage that I could see on any of the panels. All in all a great experience, if you ignore that first no-show on Monday.

And some comments on the panels themselves: These Hyperions are quite impressive. Have not tested them electrically, but the mechanical fit and finish are very nice. And they are quite sturdy, not wavy as the OP questioned about his panels. Might be that these have 2mm glass on front and back, as opposed to the 1.6mm glass of some others. I realize that this flex or lack thereof may not be a good indication of wind and hail survivability, and only real word testing will tell, but it does give some reassurance.

My only concern is there are two short (like 2" long) scratches on the front glass of one panel. Not very deep, barely deep enough to catch a finger nail on, but a scratch in the glass nonetheless. This was on a middle panel in the stack, and runs in a direction that would indicate it could not have come from our moving the panels off the stack. I am guessing it happened during manufacturing or the palletizing of the panels. I fully expect this panel will work OK now, but am concerned the scratches will compromise its hail and wind performance. Need to chat with Signature Solar about this, but really one possible dud out of a full pallet of 36 ain't bad.

So for what it's worth, that's my story on the panels and Fedex. HTH someone.
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Just give us a call! We'll get you taken care of! 903-441-2090 - They may ask you to complete a shipping damage form but as you think it could be manufacturer damage, they may not need it.
 
This is one reason I only buy from local supply houses. If something is defective or damaged, they send a truck the next day. I know this isn't an option for people in remote areas, but if you're near any metro area there's probably a local place to buy from.
 
MarkSolar said:
This is one reason I only buy from local supply houses. If something is defective or damaged, they send a truck the next day. I know this isn't an option for people in remote areas, but if you're near any metro area there's probably a local place to buy from.
Click to expand...
Yes!! We have a retail store for anyone local or whoever would like to make the drive. It's been great :)
 
Post #68 in this thread. I ordered six 550 watt PERC panels from SunGoldPower which they shipped via FEDEX. FEDEX forklift damaged two panels in a stack of six. FEDEX has a camera on the back of their rigs and had a picture of my shipment just before loading in FEDEX truck at the SGP warehouse, no damage (which they provided me). When I received them the top panel frame was damaged, The box was torn and a forklift pallet fork caught the frame and bent it but did not damage the front/glass. The very bottom panel had similar damage. Both panels produced close to VOC when in the sun as measured by my volt meter.

I provided (as requested by SGP) over a dozen pictures and the bills of lading marked damaged (and signed by me). SGP offered me $150.00 compensation for $592.00 worth of damaged panels since as SGP said they still worked.

I filed a claim with FEDEX and unknow to me SGP also filed a claim. I periodically checked in with FEDEX and finally was informed FEDEX had resolved the issue with SGP and paid SGP the $592.00.

I had a number of email communications with SGP, always being polite, never getting angry or showing frustration. SGP always responded and they offered "a big discount" for a future purchase.

I finally asked SGP what they would charge me for two rack mounted SG48100P. They came back with a quote that "more than compensated" me for the $592.00 panels, considering their batteries just went up by $400.00 on the website. I completed the purchase several hours ago. I of course then had to go to Signature Solar to order an EG4 six battery rack to hold the three SGP batteries I have and the two new one on the way.

In short SGP treated my fairly, more than reimbursed my loss of $592.00 (I still have the panels which really belong to FEDEX and will still work, I think) and I will most definitely continue to do business with SGP.

Great customer service/support from SunGoldPower.
 
Sounds like they compensated you only when you bought more items.

Which I guess is a wash in the end. But what if you didn’t need more storage.

Oh wait that’s never a thing anyone really says. lol
 
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