Three New Jersey Post Offices not able to open

Isolated interruptions of service have been reported in Central and Northern New Jersey as a result of severe flooding in communities along the Passaic, Ramapo and Delaware Rivers. Acting Governor Richard Codey has declared a state of emergency.

The Wayne, Frenchtown and Stockton Main Post Offices couldn’t open yesterday. Delivery also has been interrupted in two Trenton ZIP Codes — 08618 and 08628. Delivery in Wayne and Frenchtown is being made where streets are accessible, with operations shifted to Sheffield Station for Wayne and Milford for Frenchtown.

The Stockton Main Post Office remains closed, but delivery customers will have service where accessible. Customers will be able to pick up PO box mail and “notice left” items at the Ringoes Post Office.

The Wayne Main Post Office is expected to re-open today when flooding subsides. Frenchtown delivery and PO box operations will continue to be run from Milford, with normal operations expected to return to Frenchtown Wednesday.

eBay Entrepreneurs Often Choose UPS

eBay Entrepreneurs Often Choose UPS

ATLANTA, March 29, 2005 - Three successful entrepreneurs, including a full-time mom starting her own consignment business, a dealer in mannequins and a man who sells model aircraft to customers in Singapore and the United Kingdom, are serving as great examples of how UPS facilitates business on eBay.

The three were identified through a contest sponsored by UPS that invited small businesses to share stories of how they capitalized on the opportunities, and overcame some of the challenges, of doing business on the world’s largest online marketplace.

eBay offers even the smallest businesses the opportunity to be successful in the global marketplace. And UPS can help address some of the customer service and fulfillment challenges that arise during and after the close of an auction listing. Today’s eBay buyers and sellers have easy access to a suite of UPS shipping tools integrated throughout the eBay marketplace that allow them to calculate shipment costs, review transit times, print shipping labels and track UPS shipments, all at the point of transaction.

Mannequin madness: Four years ago, Oakland resident Judi Henderson-Townsend found herself in the business of mannequin sales and rentals after she impulsively bought 50 mannequins from a dealer who was closing up shop. Today her business, Mannequin Madness, ships mannequins across the United States and Canada and even overseas to customers ranging from clothing stores and eBay sellers to lawyers with a need to demonstrate gun or knife wounds in court to artists using them for projects or sketching. About a third of her annual sales come from eBay, where she enjoys status as a Bronze-level PowerSeller.

Henderson-Townsend began shipping with UPS using functionality on UPS.com. A chance encounter with a UPS employee at a local chamber of commerce meeting led her to UPS WorldShip, global shipping software that allows her to process her packages more efficiently, managing all her shipping activities from her computer desktop.
WorldShip allows her to print shipping labels and enables both Henderson-Townsend and her customers to track shipments online, eliminating calls from customers inquiring when their order will arrive.

“A UPS rep even helped me set up a WorldShip account and arrange a daily pickup,” she said. “Now my customers receive an automated e-mail message letting them know their package has shipped, when to expect delivery and what the tracking number is.”

Always looking for ways to streamline her business, Henderson-Townsend now is experimenting with the eBay Accounting Assistant Beta to export her eBay and PayPal transaction information directly into her QuickBooks accounting software. She also can export UPS data to QuickBooks and says the connectivity has made accounting and shipping tasks much more efficient.

Mother knows best:A full-time mom from Yakima, Wash., Natalie Phillips started her consignment auction business almost by accident after she approached her first customer about five years ago to sell his inventory on eBay.
“After we sold those items, I began selling items for other people and it’s grown from there,” she said. Today, an average week for Phillips eAuctions means shipping about 30 packages from multiple transactions.

Early on, Phillips struggled with calculating shipping costs and was unsure how to pack and ship bulky or oddly-shaped items. Using UPS OnLine Tools integrated into eBay’s site, she now prints her own labels and uses UPS’s rate and service calculator to figure an item’s shipping cost, reducing the number of bidders who get “cold feet” when the shipping charge is unknown at the time of item listing. Once a listing has closed, Phillips and customers both can track shipments from eBay’s site.

She’s also come to rely on her local The UPS Store®. “There are some things that are a real challenge to ship,” she said. “I’ve shipped chairs and had to remove the legs before. Now if I have something that requires special packaging, I take it to The UPS Store and they take care of it.”

A Prince of a business:Brian Prince of Orange, Conn., typically sells and ships 10 to 15 items per month, most often model aircraft that he builds himself and ships to buyers in Singapore and the United Kingdom. He refers to detailed information on the UPS Web site on how to ship internationally.

Prince currently ships through UPS Internet Shipping at UPS.com. He likes the automatic ship notification e-mails UPS sends to his customers. He’s never had a problem in the two years that he’s used UPS extensively and has a solid relationship with his driver, who once went above and beyond to make sure a critical Saturday Next Day Air® shipment was delivered on time.

“From this experience shipping with UPS, I have realized that they are the only carrier that I can trust and depend on for my critical shipping needs,” Prince adds.

Contest entrants were asked to summarize, in 1,000 words or less, how UPS’s technologies and solutions had helped their small businesses. The winners received US$500 in free shipping and are being recognized on the eBay site.

UPS is the world’s largest package delivery company and a global leader in supply chain services, offering an extensive range of options for synchronizing the movement of goods, information and funds. Headquartered in Atlanta, Ga., UPS serves more than 200 countries and territories worldwide. UPS's stock trades on the New York Stock Exchange (UPS) and the company can be found on the Web at UPS.com.