Getting packages delivered to the door has always required a little extra effort from our delivery drivers. Lately, some drivers have taken the shortcut of leaving parcels at the head of the docks, where they make for easy pickings. Hardest hit are the docks with gates at the entryway—A Dock’s entryway gives drivers a false sense that the area inside the gate is secure while over at the Kappas docks residents suspect that drivers are using the excuse that the gate is locked (when it is not) to leave deliveries outside the gate (by the mailboxes).
Seasonal drivers (hired during periods of increased deliveries) need to be reminded that door-to-door delivery is not the exception but the rule—and additionally, to take care to deliver the package to the correct dock. Lazlo Toth and Linda Rittenberry (A Dock), who themselves don’t order online, can be commended for shepherding errant packages to their destinations on nearby East Pier as well as seeing that their own neighbors get their deliveries. When asked about the incidence of packages being left on the bench in the entryway Linda reported, “the A Dock piles have been too numerous over the last two months to count.”
This problem is not unique to the floating homes community. The incidence of theft in Sausalito over the holidays—by so-called Porch Pirates—was a recurring topic on Nextdoor.com. And given the convenience of ordering goods online this is not a problem that is likely to go away on its own. Underlying all this is the reasonable expectation that packages get delivered to the door. There are some things you can do.
Speaking directly to the situation, Teddie Hathaway (East Pier) had this to say, “I talked with a delivery person the other day about the fact that so many packages were being left at the head of the dock rather than being delivered to the addresses. She said that when you order online it is helpful to put into the notes section that the dock gates are not locked—new delivery people don’t usually know that.”
That may not be enough. On A Dock, where even the lending library is routinely stripped of its books—it’s all too easy for passersby to grab anything left in the entry—exasperation reached an all-time high. Sally Champe, after finding a package of hers at the gate a few weeks back, shared this in a dock group email, “I called Amazon and I told them I would not order any more Amazon products if they would not guarantee delivery to my door. They promised they would. I got a package delivered to my door on Sunday,” adding “Amazon has be threatened to get your packages delivered safely.”
Since then, Sally reports, she’s received packages at her door. Regardless of your course of action—whether you take care to fill in the notes section with delivery instructions, speak with a delivery person, or phone the merchant directly to express you’d like your package delivered to your home, thank you very much—take some comfort in knowing that these efforts are cumulative, and that collectively we can ensure that getting deliveries to our front door becomes a matter of standard practice.