Woman struggles to get UPS to pay for broken plates
WALNUT CREEK, Calif. (KGO) -- Several pieces of fine china that belonged to a Bay Area family for 40 years were broken while being shipped cross country. They contacted 7 On Your Side after the shipper declined to pay for replacements. So one local family found out that filing a claim is easy, but proving you packed your shipment correctly is much more difficult.
Karen Cassano of Walnut Creek is used to shipping things. She has a daughter who lives in Spain and another in Tennessee. The one in Tennessee asked if she could get the family's set of bone china and mom agreed to ship it.
"All the dishes were in here, double wrapped like this," Cassano said.
Cassano says she lined the box with bubble wrap and wrapped each individual dish. Four pieces arrived damaged after being delivered by UPS. Chunks of china cracked right off the plate.
She brought her insurance claim and pictures to The UPS Store in Walnut Creek. UPS later declined her claim of $147 to replace the broken pieces because she didn't save the packing materials. She went back to the store to protest.
"'You didn't tell us that we had to save the packing.' And there was nothing in writing that said we had to save the packing," Cassano said.
UPS told her it would look into it. She says she followed up several times, but the store didn't respond. That's when she contacted 7 On Your Side.
"I bought the insurance in good faith and they didn't tell me there were conditions," Cassano said.
We contacted UPS and it told us it could not determine the cause of the damage without the packing material. UPS says it's customary for it to give customers instructions about keeping the packing material, but can't say with 100 percent certainty that it did in this case. "Because we were not able to conduct an investigation, we made a goodwill payment of $147.00 to Ms. Cassano to reimburse her for the damages."
"Fabulous, I thought 7 On Your Side did it. I just felt it was fair," Cassano said.
