Online crush has shippers rethinking deliveries

If you’ve ever missed the UPS delivery guy while you’re at work and didn’t get your package, UPS might have another option for you.

The company is now partnering with local shops to act as "Access Point" locations where customers can pick up their packages or drop them off. In recent months, UPS has launched Access Points in metro Atlanta.

Jason Syptak, who lives in New York and has used Access Points a few times, calls the system “really, really helpful.”

“With the Access Points, they allow you to go [pick up packages] when you want to,” Syptak said. “It’s essentially giving the consumer the control, and I absolutely love that.”

But not everyone is happy about it.

“I don’t think I should have to leave my house to go somewhere else that I didn’t want my package delivered to at all,” said Boston resident Andrew Mannone.

Some customers have taken to Twitter to express surprise at discovering that their UPS package has been left at an unexpected location.

“UPS sent me to the sketchiest convenience store to pick up a package,” wrote one Twitter user.

But for UPS and other shipping companies, the development of alternate forms of delivery is driven by the astronomical rise in online shopping. As consumers order more and more products online, the phenomenon has driven huge spikes in deliveries to doorsteps and taxed traditional shipping systems.

For more on where some Access Points in metro Atlanta are located, how they work and how they fit into UPS's strategy amid the growth of e-commerce, read the full story on myajc.com.

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