Walter Hutchens’ Blog

I’m a FedEX fan, but today I’m annoyed that they returned an international package to me because the “entire” address was not “in English.”

I wrote “Beijing, China” in English and gave them the appropriate numeric postal code (Chinese zip code), but the specific street address was in Chinese characters. That would of course be much more helpful once it gets to Beijing!

I did not just write the address on the form and dump it in a box; I handed it to an employee at Kinko’s who was able to figure the charges and accept the package using the city/province, country and postal code I provided. He noticed the Chinese characters on the other address lines (we chatted about him sending stuff to the Philippines), but he raised no concerns. FedEX does not charge different rates depending on where in Beijing a package is going. But nonetheless the next day a FedEX driver returned the package to me. Someone at FedEx had scrawled “void” on the air bill and taped a handwritten note on the package indicating the entire address must be in English.

When I called to inquire/complain/explain the rep tried to say all their agents in China are “bilingual” (which was NOT my experience during the five years I lived in Beijing!) so they can use the “English” address. She confirmed it is company policy to require that the entire address be written on the air bill “in English.”

Well, besides the fact that in China they do read Chinese most easily (hello?), putting an address in “English” can create ambiguity (and therefore potentially delays) even if their agents are indeed bilingual. Do they mean I should put the Chinese street address in pinyin, as in “Fu Hua Da Sha,” (or should it be Fuhua Dasha? And however one parses it, the problem remains that identical pinyin Romanizations can mean quite different things in Chinese). Or do they mean I should literally translate the address into Enlish, as in “Affluent/Rich/Prosperous (which?) China Building/Mansion (again, which?).”

Arghhh.

The US Postal Service can route a package to the right country and then let the local language address take over; how odd FedEx cannot or will not. They are inflicting on themselves and their customers an increased chance of confusion and delay, not it seems making things more efficient. The entire world does not use our alphabet. Deal.

I did confirm that one may write BOTH the “English” and Chinese address on a FedEX air bill, but having already gotten my parcel bounced back once, I opted to just put in the “English” version to avoid any more inane delays on this end. I can only hope there are none on the China side. I did what I could to avoid that.

I presume they will not try to charge me $78 twice.

This is one more reason to rely on email whenever possible!