Another way to get packages

We had placed a couple of orders to be delivered while we were in Palm Springs. The campground will accept packages from USPS and we can pick them up from the office for a $2 charge. Or... UPS and FedEx deliver to the site.

The problem is: I don't know how any given package is going to be sent! In this case, I could get a UPS or FedEx package delivered directly to the door of the bus for no additional charge... obviously that is nice!

This time, when checking out from Amazon, I decided to look up to see if there was an Amazon "locker" nearby. It turned out that there was, just about a mile down the road. So... I decided to have our Amazon Prime order shipped there (one item I was ordering was not Prime, and that order was not allowed to be sent to a locker). The package was supposed to be delivered on Friday, 12/22, by 8pm. I checked status multiple times... I wasn't sure how the process worked to get the package from the locker. Ultimately, it didn't get delivered on Friday, and there was no delivery on Saturday, Sunday, or Monday.

On Tuesday, we had two packages that were due to be delivered - one was coming to our site via UPS and the other to the Amazon locker. The UPS truck showed up at our site and we got that box. I thought about asking him if he had a package for the locker for us... but thought that he probably did not have the ability to deliver it somewhere else. A few minutes after the box arrived that was addressed to our site, I got notified that the package going to the locker had arrived there.

So, on Wednesday, we went to the locker. The address was at the local Chevron station. We cruised around for a minute or so and were about to park and go in to ask where the lockers were when Dwayne saw a set of yellow boxes outside the store.

The sun reflection makes it looks like there is a sign from above, doesn't it?!? But that's what the Amazon locker looks like.

There was a VERY difficult to read screen. It asked me to enter the code I had been sent by Amazon. There was also a bar code reader and I had gotten a bar code in an email from Amazon. The email and the notification from Amazon both came after the package was delivered to the locker.

After I entered the code, an arrow prompted me to look to the left for the open locker...

And there was our package!

It was interesting that the top of the locker was a mirrored surface so even though it was higher than head height for us, we could tell that there was only one package in there. I didn't check, but my guess is that the locker locked the door closed after we took our package out and let the door close.

This worked out well for us. I would think it would also work well for people who live in places where packages get stolen from the front porch (as seems to be common in our previous hometown of Coppell now). As I mentioned above, I guess only packages that are "fulfilled by Amazon" are eligible to go to a locker - I guess because then Amazon knows how big the package is in which the item is being shipped (not all box sizes would fit into the lockers at this location). The email from Amazon indicated that I had 3 days to pick it up or it would be returned to Amazon and we'd get a full refund.