I’ve been awaiting a package I ordered from Dell. It was supposedly picked up by “DHL”:http://www.dhl-usa.com/home/home.asp from a distribution in Fontana, California on Tuesday the 27th in the early afternoon. The estimated delivery date was supposed to be today. The tracking information hasn’t changed since Tuesday, it’s still showing an estimated delivery date of today even though there isn’t any indication that it has even arrived in Seattle.

I realize that their front end might be lagging their logistics system, but it is now 5pm. I’ll be very suprised if it arrives before next Monday or Tuesday, at this point. I wonder when they’ll finally get around to updating their delivery estimate.

My theory, it fell of a truck and they still haven’t realized its gone.

Update (1/2/06):Three days later, they’ve finally updated the shipping info. My package is in f’ing Chehalis (half way to Portland). Estimated delivery date? Still 12/30/2005.

Another Update: A few months later, I order something else from Dell. It also ships via DHL. It also ends up being very late. I called Dell days after the package was due, which was also days after DHLs tracking system said it had arrived in Seattle. The Dell rep tells me that DHL has determined the package was lost and that a new one will be shipped out. A few days later, the package arrives, same tracking number and info as the original package.

I’m starting to suspect that Dell gets DHL to fudge the tracking information so that Dell can actually ship products days after they say they do.

Note: My wife uses DHL for pretty much all our personal packages and has been very happy with them.