TL;DR. UPS Store is hugely anti gun.  The ups store 6631 is even worse.  And their asst manager Valerie is a raging thundercunt.  Feel free to do with the info as you will. I certainly won’t ever be back


So I am trying to avoid the USPS like the plague right now

I sold an Aimpoint here, and decided since I had a little spare time today I would go up to my local ups store and ship it

So I headed up to this store:

Store 6631
9994 Sowder Village Sq
Manassas, VA 20109
P: 703-367-7200
Email: [email protected]

When the store opened, pre covid, there was a nice old couple that owned it and I used it many times.  The last time I saw last year they were talking about selling the store and retiring

Apparently they did...to Donna Hollis.  Who I have not spoken to.  She is apparently the franchise owner.  No, unfortunately I got to deal with

Valerie Butler
Assistant Manager!

I should have known this wasn’t going to go well, because when I got there Valerie was pulling in the sign.  I didn’t realize I’d arrived 15 minutes before closing but I had.  When I walked in they were already vacuuming.  Ok.

All was well with my shipment until I asked to insure it for $420.  She then asked what was in the box.  I told her an aimpoint.

And that’s where the fight started....

Valerie, very rudely, told me they don’t ship firearms, and pointed to a sign.

The sign said, specifically, that firearms and parts as defined by section blah blah of federal code blah blah won’t be accepted for shipment.  It said items outside that would be accepted for shipment  

Great.  I assured Valerie it wasn’t a gun.  Offered to opened the box for her to show her.  She just continued to yell at me.  It didn’t matter that what I was trying to ship might fall outside of the prohibitions

Valerie continue to point at the top part, and refused to even acknowledge the exceptions printed right on her sign

This went on longer than I should have let it, and then another employee (Ms Vacuum) decided to interject herself into the conversation while waving a piece of paper at me

Did I mention that as Valerie got louder and louder and ruder and ruder the first thing she would say is “don’t yell at me sir” and then yelled and yelled and sassed and sassed

I asked Ms Vacuum if i could see the page she was waving at me.  She refused, just screamed louder, and waved the paper harder.

At that point I ejected like I should have earlier and proceeded to drive to the UPS Store in Gainesville.  Store 5000.  There I was assisted by two gentlemen.  I opened the box.  Showed them the contents.  Asked if they would ship it.  Yep, absolutely sir.  And off it went, insured, no problem.  I shared my tale with them and they said 6631 was a different franchise owner (Donna).

While driving I decided to call UPS Store corporate, ask their policy, and lodge a complaint against 6631 and their manager Valerie.  Because I also believe good jobs should be rewarded I also filed a compliment for store 5000.

Sure enough, the ups store corporate policy is so anti gun that they refuse to even ship scopes. I was unaware. I will never set foot in a ups store again.  Even 5000. Sorry guys. You were great, but fuck your corporate anti gun policy. If you read their policy verbatim skate board tape is a forbidden item because it can be used on a gun.  Seriously?  Have we become that big a group or pussies?

All UPS stores are independent franchises basically and have been anti gun for years. This is not new. I know for at least the last 10-15 years they’ve been this way.

In order to ship a gun you have to go to a UPS hub.

Sure

‘But I was shipping an aimpoint acro


Not a gun. Or ammo.  Both those go straight to the ups hub

Several years ago I used a UPS store at 107 S. West Street in old town Alexandria. Probably did business with them for 6-7 years for package receipt. A lot of AK kits and builds went back and forth, and towards the end of my patronage, they notarized a private transfer of a receiver at the seller’s request. I think prior to the receiver, they were unaware previously of gun parts moving thru their store. No signs posted.

That changed when I came in to ship an AK  kit and receiver to a gunsmith. I didn’t even tell them what it was. They announced loudly that they would not ship guns. Same drill, offered to open box, it’s just disassembled parts...more loud pronouncments by the male 1/2 of the couple that owned the franchise, while the female half giggled. I think they believed they were striking a blow against the patriarchy or something.

I left, spent a few days changing my mailing address, closed my mailbox with them as soon as I could.

Incidentally, in the late 1990s, UPS lost my M1A receiver, stock and parts en route to Fulton Armory... shipped 2nd day Air & insured, photographed etc.  Missing for a month! They then tried to avoid compensating me via insurance. When I noted that it contained a firearms receiver and I was obligated to report their loss/theft of a firearm to BATF... the package was mysteriously found.

Fuck UPS.

They are/have been anti gun and anything that pertains to guns. This includes scopes, sights, grips, etc.

Personally, yes it’s stupid. But as they say in GD, their business, their rules.

Yep. My experience as well.

Should have said it was a camera lens.

The sad thing is I’ve shipped shit like this through tons of times.  I’ve either just encountered clerks completely unaware of the policy, or ones that are aware of it, know it’s stupid, and just don’t care/

From reading shit since this happened I’ve definitely learned that this was something well known that I just wasnt aware of,  if I knew how fucking anti gun they were I’d have stopped using them long ago.

So, yes, lesson learned

And I never debated their business, their rules.  I just wasn’t aware their shitty rules were so well known.  Oh, and a pox upon assistant managbitch Val

Think UPS Stores have a policy not to ship any gun stuff.  I think they are all franchises. You have to go to a real UPS hub.

The Fed Ex places are better IME - at least the one I used to go to in Fairfax was easy peasy.  They shipped handguns for me without hassle.

UPS sucks. I find that their rates and delivery times suck for the most part. I actually believe them to be worse than USPS, and maybe comparable on other days.

Damn, that sucks.

Next time "Optical equipment" might slide?

But yeah, store 5000 is excellent.  Was in there earlier today.  Professional service, nice folks.  Thank you for giving them some positive feedback.

It’s funny, UPS has no issue with shipping gun parts from online retailers to our homes.

Your fault for being honest.   You could have told her it was a bird watching monocular or something.

This is what you get for trying to rationalize with a NoVA thundercunt.

UPS and UPS Store are not the same thing. You can go to a UPS hub and ship a gun, I did it a long time ago and people still do it today.

I took a package to the UPS Store near me years ago,

I was shipping a small box of ammo to someone,

had it boxed, labeled correctly etc etc and the store said no,

keep in mind,  until then we used a packaging and shipping store that would mail/ship anything anywhere,  ups/fedex/usps,  no worries  but the owner closed up,

so,  back to the store,
clerk see the ORM-D sticker and starts with the questions,

nope, no gunparts, nope no ammo,  hub only , not legal , blah blah blah,

so I asked again,  
sames

so I repeated what I was told,,  as in you will not ship or have anything to do with anything firearm related,
yup,, the clerk said,

clerk got real pissy when I asked about the tall stack of ammo directly behind her against the wall,,,(someone using one of the mail boxes on the location had it shipped to them,,,)

OP-  I had the exact same experience with the UPS store in Mechanicsville, VA.  I tried to ship an Aimpoint out a year or so ago.  They refused, stating that they don't ship firearms or parts.  I explained what an Aimpoint was and they (UPS Store nitwits) said it is part of a gun.  I left there and went to the FED-Ex store down the street where they were all to happy to have my business.  That is when I learned that the UPS stores are absolute commie centers.

F UPS Stores.

I am the weapon, will you ship me?

Optics/camera parts

And

Machined parts


That’s the only things they need to know in regards to items from this industry.