How does a UPS pickup work?

[jeremkante_0]

Thinking of selling an item that I can only ship via UPS pickup, so I'm just wondering about the details of how this works. For context, my residence is at the side door of a main house, but when getting a delivery UPS ALWAYS ignores the "side door" notation on the address, so this is one of my main concerns. Do they contact you at all before the pickup, and then you personally hand over the item? Or are you expected to just leave the package outside your door, and just hope they don't confuse it with other packages that may happen to be around (assuming in my case they even go to the correct door.) Also, is there a separate fee for the pickup?

[wastingtime101]

UPS does charge a pickup fee.

In my experience they don't call - you just leave the package wherever they typically drop your incoming items and they take it.

While there is a box on the pickup request form to enter special instructions (like pickup at side door), there's no guarantee the driver, who is usually in a rush and under time constraints, will even read those instructions, let alone follow them.

[jeremkante_0]

Ok. So is it a flat fee, regardless of how far the package has to travel?

[wastingtime101]

Yes, it's just a pickup fee - has nothing to do with destination of package.

Fee will vary depending how/where you schedule the pickup - in other words: direct with UPS, through a third party's UPS account, etc.

[redmodelt]

I have a UPS account and think the pickup fee was something like $3.00. 

[wastingtime101]

Personal UPS accounts will frequently get the best deals if they do a lot of volume.

The rate through pirateship.com is pretty great at $4.25 a pickup.

I don't know what the rate is when scheduling through the link on the eBay label confirmation page, if you get a discounted contracted rate or if it's the standard UPS rate of $8.50.

https://www.ups.com/us/en/business-solutions/pickup-dropoff-options/ups-on-call-pickup.page

[redmodelt]

Update: I just went to UPS page and check cost of scheduled pickup:

It is $8.50 for non same day pickup and $13.50 for same day pickup. 

Sorry about incorrect price in my other post. 

[wastingtime101]

Ah, so you're paying the published rates from the link I posted above @redmodelt . Do you regularly schedule UPS pickups? If so, you could save a bundle by scheduling them through an account at pirateship.com

[redmodelt]

I don't use UPS pickup service. I looked online signing in on my account didn't use the link. I can drive to the nearest UPS store for a lot less, it is only a few miles away so was just correcting my earlier post.