We have been using FedEx shipping the last several months for our customer’s shipping needs with great success. They are always on time and provide timely tracking information as well. What we really like about them is that they will deliver on Saturday without an extra charge. UPS Ground charges a premium for Saturday delivery and it is not always available in all areas.
We still predominantly use UPS Ground shipping but for certain destinations, FedEx just works out better. For instance, shipping product to Texas via UPS Ground used to originate from the manufacturer in Arizona and would require 3 business days. But now we can ship the same product from Ohio and it will actually arrive a full business day sooner. In practice, this means that a customer in Texas can order a reverse osmosis system from us on Thursday before noon and receive that RO on Saturday. Pretty impressive.

But FedEx is not available at our Arizona location just yet, so any orders from the west end of the country will ship via UPS Ground.

One thing FedEx cannot economically do is ship hazardous material. Yes, we do sell a couple of “Haz-Mat” items here at Water Value. Potassium permanganate is a powerful oxidizer used to remove filtered iron from greensand iron filters, and dry chlorine pellets, another oxidizer, is used to supply our dry chlorine pellet droppers.

When a customer orders a system or products from us, we will make sure that they will receive the shipment in as little time as possible and will select the most expedient method available, but even if FedEx is quicker in some circumstances, we are not always able to make use of their service.

It’s tax time and while it’s income tax we’re talking about, it’s also time to report any sales tax you may need to pay to your state. Water Value Company is based in the state of Michigan, so we are able to take care of sales tax on Michigan sales, but customers from out of state are required to report any sales tax for items purchased anywhere their respective states do not have tax jurisdiction. There is at least one state I know of where there is no sales tax and that’s Tennessee.

It’s much easier to report and pay out of state sales tax when you’re getting a refund. Besides, if the individual states feel that they are losing too much money from out of state sales, you know what will happen. The federal government will be prompted to take action and impose a nationwide sales tax. Let’s try to avoid that at all costs.