LandfallVoyages

When we bought our “new” Perkins 4.108 engine, we knew up front that the fuel injection pump was leaking and needed to be rebuilt–that’s why we got a such a good price on the engine. The previous owner had been quoted $1000.00 to have it rebuilt by a marine outfit in the San Francisco Bay area. Since Perkins diesels are commonly used around the world for compressors, generators, water pumps, and tractors, I suspected we could probably get the fuel injection pump repaired cheaper if we used a place that a)didn’t specialize in marine engines and b)wasn’t located in one of the most expensive places to live in the world (well, maybe not the world, but still–SF Bay is pretty pricey) to get the fuel injection pump repaired. I was quite sure that a tractor place will be a bit cheaper.

After trolling the internet for an absurd amount of time, I found Oregon Fuel Injection in Eugene, Oregon. That’s a tractor kind of place, not a multi-million dollar yacht kind of place. I called them up to discuss my potential repairs and determined that they were affordable at $479.00 and that they knew their stuff. It seems that they rebuild the injection pumps FOR Perkins. That’s enough for me. The manufacturer of the engines uses these guys to rebuild their pumps? Yes, that’s good. OFI was also willing to look at the pump from our old Perkins 4.107, which was working well before the previous owner of Landfall let water flow into the engine. If it was in good enough shape, it might have value to them as a core, saving us a couple hundred bucks.

I had some USPS flat rate boxes hanging around the shop, so that’s what caused my error in judgement, the seductive convenience of their pre-provided box. The Postal Service has an extremely strong union. Unions are basically a good thing but like any big organization, there are problems. An extremely strong union can produce a bad sort of human, sometimes. This type of person knows every rule inside and out, and uses that knowledge to do everything in their power to ensure that nothing gets done. He or she will be as unpleasant as possible throughout the entire grueling process, always of course, staying within the rules. This fine union member will make you hate your life and then go home feeling good about this accomplishment because that’s their only real power, to crush one’s hope. Unfortunately, I found him. Wilbur.

I printed out my handy and convenient USPS prepaid over the internet shipping label and dutifully taped it to the convenient box full of my 30 year old fuel injection parts and took it to the convenient Post Office around the corner and conveniently, I didn’t have to wait in line to pay because I already had my convenient label, so all I had to do was slide the box over the convenient counter to the busy employee who conveniently didn’t need to provide me with any verification that I had actually carried the box to the Post Office to ship it.

It’s a one or two day trip from here to Oregon for a box full of fuel injection parts, so I called OFI two days later to see if they had received it and to see what they thought about the spare, potentially valuable injection pump. They checked all around and couldn’t find any record of my package having arrived. I was pretty sure it should have been there by this time, but it wasn’t, so I jumped into my favorite hobby, stressing out. This was Friday afternoon, of course, and Monday was a holiday, so I had a whole three-day weekend to stress out before I could make any more calls about our missing box. I checked the tracking information online about a thousand times over the weekend, even though I knew there wouldn’t be any new information and all it told me was what I already knew–that I’d printed out a shipping label on May 24th.

The following Tuesday, I went down to the Post Office to try and figure out what was going on. The nice lady behind the counter printed out a sheet of paper that said that I had printed the label on the 24th and that was about it, so I asked to speak to the supervisor. She told me that the supervisor was the one who had printed out the paper and that he had already told her that no more information was available. She seemed pretty worried that I would ask to speak to him about it. Wilbur.

I didn’t insist on talking to the supervisor, because the nice lady behind the counter looked so worried about it and I wanted to call the USPS 800 number,  hoping they’d be able to mine some more details about my package’s likely demise. As I was wading through their soul-sucking phone tree, I read through the paper through once more and found a hidden gem. Down near the bottom it said “VISIBLE DAMAGE 5/27/2011” and “ASSIGNMENT ZIP CODE 93199”. Google told me that 93199 is Goleta, which is where all of our mail goes first before it goes anywhere else.

Apparently, there is no way to speak to a live representative unless you enter a tracking number first. After I entered my tracking number, the computer decided that I could not speak to a live representative because there was no further info available for my tracking number. I called Goleta. There was no phone number available for the processing plant, only the local Goleta office and they had even less info than I did. The lady there recommended that I call my local P.O. I called them and got the shipping supervisor, Mr. Russell A. Wilbur.

Mr. Wilbur pointed out that I had no proof that I actually mailed the package. Now that’s helpful. Thanks, Wilbur. I decided to hang up on the illustrious Mr. Wilbur and call back in a few minutes to see if I could get somebody who would actually be helpful. My next call landed me a guy who really did want to help, but unfortunately, he couldn’t really add anything new. He said to wait a few days. Dammit, I didn’t want to wait a few days. This was the last part of my engine that needs work–we are so close…but I wait a few days anyway.

Nothing. Eugene, Oregon hasn’t seen it, SLO hasn’t seen it, and Oregon Fuel Injection certainly hasn’t seen it. One lady in the Eugene Post Office says that I have to wait 30 days to file an insurance claim, but the lady in Goleta says that I only need to wait 15 days because it’s Priority Mail and the guy in SLO, Russell A. Wilbur, says that the claim will be denied due to lack of proof. There’s that proof thing again. Thanks Wilbur. It’s a week into a 2 day trip and you’re telling me it’s my fault that the Postal Service lost the box? Once again, I deduced that the only rational thing to do was hang up and hope that somebody different would answer the phone. It worked!

A very, very helpful guy (must not know that he’s union 😉 gave me the super secret unobtanium number of the Goleta plant and also the number of the Santa Barbara Postmaster (that they’re never supposed to give out to anybody–shhh!). Eventually, I got through to a lady. It was Friday afternoon again. She was too busy to talk and asked me to call back after 2:00, so I did.  And the phone rang and rang and rang and nobody answered. I tried over and over and… nothing. Another weekend to flip out, not knowing how in the hell I was ever going to find another fuel injection pump that I could afford for what the insurance payout would be. The core charge alone was $100 more than the maximum amount I was able to insure the box for and I would still need 4 fuel injectors as well.

On Monday I called and called again and actually got through to the Queen of the Postal world, Olga. I explained to her what had happened and she was totally willing to help in any way that she could. She asked if it would be OK if she looked into the situation and called me back and that’s what she did. As it turned out she actually went out into the plant and found the guy who made the “VISIBLE DAMAGE” note. WOW! She found out what happened. She had to leave work just then and passed me off to another woman named Delia. I thought I was screwed for sure then, I’d lost the only person who could ever find my box. I was wrong. Delia was all over it.

She went and found the guy again and he told her that he had locked the box in the isolation room because it smelled of diesel and that he was afraid that there was a bomb of some sort inside. He said he had entered the info into the computer and that it must have deleted itself somehow. Delia grabbed the box and brought it to the counter as she was talking to me. All at once she said that she had to run outside with my box because the truck to San Luis Obispo was pulling out of the driveway right that minute. Believe it or not, she caught the truck! She called me right back to tell me that the box would be right back where I’d left it almost 2 weeks before after another hour passed. She warned me to go right there to get it because the delivery driver might refuse to return it to me due to the smell and I could disappear again. I went down to the local Post Office to retrieve the package and who do I get? Russell A. Fucking Wilbur. Cocksucker. I wonder what the A stands for?

So I asked the ever trivial little Mr. Wilbur, the feckless imitation hippy who loves to smear misery around like it’s butter and jam, if he could please find my box for me. Now it would be safe to assume that I’ve been mean or rude or sarcastic to some of the more vacuous people that I’ve talked to so far but in fact I haven’t. I’ve learned that with government employees it doesn’t matter what you threaten them with and no matter how loud you yell, they’ve heard louder and scarier before and probably today. I beg. I grovel on the ground like a puppy. I plead and I plead but I never try to intimidate or use sarcasm. I just beg. I asked the disagreeable Mr. Wilbur every way possible to help me and he refused. He would not even try. At all. He said it was not possible for him to even look at the shipment to see if there was even one flat rate box on top that could be mine. Nothing. Nothing at all. No, I could not speak to his supervisor, he was the supervisor. Rat Bastard.

In an absolute fury I left there. When I returned to my shop I tried again to call the 800 number to report slimy Mr. Wilbur, but there was still no way through the phone tree to a human, not even one at the call center in India. First time I ever actually wanted to speak to some dude named Roger with a Hindi accent.

After my most recent failure with the Post Office I had lost all confidence in my abilities. It didn’t seem to matter at all how determined I was, nothing was ever going to get resolved here. After I stormed and spit and screamed, I calmed down and thought. I realized that the only thing that had helped me so far was my dogged persistence on the phone so I called the local Post office one last time. I was so sure that I would get the same long haired ill-disposed supervisor, Mr. Wilbur, that I almost didn’t even bother, but I called anyway. I didn’t get the little prick however, I got somebody that wanted to help. Unbelievable. He walked away to look at the shipment and was back on the phone within 30 seconds. He had my box in his hands. Right then. I rushed back down to the P.O. for what seemed like the thousandth time and there was my box, just like he said. By the time I got back to the shop with it I felt like I had triumphed, like I’d just won a major battle, but then there was the reality. Two weeks and my box was right back where it started.

I shipped it UPS this time.