DHL @home

Quite possibly the worst idea. Ever... Or at least in shipping. Anyway. According to DHL's website:

DHL@home

DHL has partnered with the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) to create a new service designed for business-to-residence shippers who desire a secure, cost-effective shipping solution. Shipments are picked up by DHL and delivered directly to your customers by the local post office.

Features and Benefits

• An efficient service for shipments from businesses to U.S. residential locations, including P.O. boxes
• Standard delivery within 2 - 4 business days, Deferred delivery within 2 - 7 business days
• Shipments up to 70 lbs.
• Door-to-door visibility and tracking

So, DHL picks up the package. Ships it to the city where it's supposed to go, and then, even though they're in the same area as the intended destination, they don't deliver it. They drop it off at the nearest post office, by which time the mail courier has most likely already left the office for delivery, so it will just sit in the office, to be delivered the next day.

This is not progress. It unnecessarily prolongs the delivery time, with the only potential benefit being that USPS can leave items in your mail box, and not require a signature. But the potential benefit is only there if the package is small enough to fit your mail box. If it's not, they will still have to leave it at your door, which is what DHL would have done anyway. I mean, when was the last time the USPS left something weighing around 70 lbs. in your mail box? Or even 5 lbs.?

And even though they say "door-to-door visibility and tracking" as one of the features (which they provide with their regular service), on my package, it seems to stop right at "arrive at USPS." I may be proved wrong tomorrow, but as far as I can tell, it's not going to tell me the delivery progress of USPS from DHL's website. And there's no link to the tracking service at USPS.

Considering that my package shipped from Fresno, California, if it had been delivered via USPS from the beginning, I probably would have received the package already yesterday. Maybe, just maybe, if the package had been sent from across the country, it would have been faster via DHL... if they flew it over on one of their planes. Somehow I doubt they would have put it on a plane for standard shipping, though. So there couldn't possibly be any benefits from using this system.