The UPS Store

It is like senior spring in this store. I have been in several times, and the employees always have such blasé attitudes– as if my presence in their store is an inconvenience. Sometimes I can hear multiple employees in the back just chatting as one employee out front helps a huge line of customers. Today, I went in to buy a specific office supply that they normally have, but didn’t see in their display. I asked the employee if they had it. He asks, «It it over there?» (If it was in the thing I just looked through, why would I be asking him?) When I told him it wasn’t, he said, «Then we probably don’t have it.» Um probably? Could you go check the stock room or something? Apparently not. I’m not writing this review about that experience, however. It’s about all of them. It’s always a frustrating experience in this store that makes me never want to use UPS again.

We needed a notary to transfer our car title to our friends to whom we were giving it to. Our friends & the car are in North Carolina. So bear in mind we had to mail the title each time. We first went to the UPS store on Brazos street, and they made a mistake, they were very apologetic and didn’t charge me for the notarization. DMV in NC rejected it, took it back to Brazos UPS to be correctly notarized. They misspelled my last name, so DMV rejected it again. Went back to Brazos st but it was closed so came to this one in the Hilton.
Worker (not manager) notarized it for me, but I recognized he was making the same mistake the first notary made – he said «No, that’s right» I said, «I’m pretty sure it’s not» he said, «Oh no, I’m not allowed to write your name there… it’s against TX notary policy.» He was mistaken. I finally took it to our bank (Wells Fargo) and they said, «yea, that’s wrong» and they notarized it correctly and free of charge.
In addition, at UPS I said, «we’ve been having to mail this back and forth to our friends three times now because of all the mistakes you guys have made, I’d like for you guys to expedite this for free due to all the mistakes you’ve made» He said, «Oh, I can’t do that.»
This is poor customer service and they mis-​notarized our document three times by three different employees. I won’t be taking my business to UPS unless I have to mail something pre-​labeled.

No way you would spot this store from the street — it’s inside the lobby of the Hilton. The reason I went to this location is that it seems to be the only Austin location that’s open on Sunday, and I was anxious to send back some shoes to Piperlime. One of the great things about Piperlime is that they include a pre-​paid UPS label in the original box, so all you have to do is affix the label and drop it off at the store… or that’s how it’s supposed to work. I feel like my irritation was justified when the unctuous clerk in this store informed me there was a $ 5 «drop-​off fee» at this particular location.
I made sure to restate the fact that the box already had a pre-​paid label, but there was no confusion there. When I said I would take it to another location, he muttered something about the other locations having a similar fee. Oddly enough, I had no problems dropping the box off at the UPS store on Lamar and 38^th, and the pre-​paid label seemed adequate to the staff there. I can understand needing to charge an extra fee if it were a UPS service provided by Hilton and not a branded UPS store; as it is, I won’t waste my time in this location in the future. Why would they need to charge that fee? If you’re a traveler staying at the hotel, would you have brought your pre-​paid purchases with you on your trip to return from your hotel?