Time for *my* UPS horror story. My wife was asked to provide the wedding cake for friends back east (daughter of her Girl Scout co-leader).
We shipped a box of important items (including the cake topper) UPS next-day air. When we checked the tracking number, we saw it was scheduled to go ground freight. Despite the fact that in the next 24 hours it went through three different scan-and-check stations UPS were unable (or unwilling) to pull the package off the truck and send it by air. It arrived at the local UPS depot on Friday. But they couldn't even locate it there and let someone drive down to collect it - it just got loaded onto a local delivery van for delivery on Monday - six days after it was supposed to be delivered overnight, and too late for the wedding (on the Saturday). Finally, to add insult to injury, the only recompense that UPS offered was to refund the *difference* between ground and air shipping. That's the last time I've ever used UPS for anything, and I let them know that (and the fact that I would pass on this story to as many people as I could).