BrownCafe

A family’s priceless painting ended up missing after it was shipped through UPS. After a call to Better Call Behnken, the painting has been found and shipped where it was supposed to go on Valentine’s Day.

Joan O’Dowd is grateful that the sentimental painting is now in her daughter’s condo in Chicago.

“It means a lot to her,” she said. “She was 3-years-old the day that I acquired it, my husband and I,” O’Dowd said. “She said she just sobbed when she saw it.”

Art has been a big part of Joan O’Dowd’s life. Especially two paintings of the iconic lions outside the Chicago Art Institute, near where she grew up.

“They have a lot of sentimental value to me because I met the artist when I was a little toddler and then again when I was a teenager in his home,” she said.

He says he learned everything from his father, Dominic.

Randy Pace, a daily fixture in Madison as a beloved UPS delivery driver, says he watched his father while growing up in Connecticut. Dominic, Randy says, was a natural salesman and a reader who spent time every day trying to improve his mind.

“My father used to do a lot of reading,” Pace says. “He had a knack to make people feel better about themselves. He always made people feel like a big deal.”

In fact, last Friday, during a torrential rainstorm, an organic gathering of Randy’s customers trickled in to Town Park to wish the driver well. Word spread like the death of a family member and friend that Pace has been moved by UPS to the Greensboro route. The news prompted a moment, in the rain.

Over the past two years, Thomas Woods’ work as a United Parcel Service driver has been more important than ever.

Delivery drivers provided a vital service during the pandemic as they brought consumers who were staying home essential goods, medicines and more. According to a statement from UPS, the drivers known for their brown trucks and brown uniforms averaged over 20 million packages per day in 2020 delivering not only goods but PPE and COVID-19 vaccines as well.

Woods, of Conroe, was among that legion and recently he was recognized for 30 years of safe driving as he served communities between Conroe and Houston.

Since 1991, Woods has logged more than 600,000 miles in his truck without so much as a fender bender.

United Parcel Service Inc. (UPS) has agreed to pay roughly $5.3 million to settle claims it falsely reported delivery times for U.S. Mail carried internationally under contracts with the U.S. Postal Service (USPS), the Justice Department reported Monday.

Under a reported contract with USPS, UPS was scheduled to pick up U.S. mail at six locations across the United States including other Department of Defense and State Department locations abroad. The mail was expected to be delivered to various international and domestic destinations. according to the State Department.

The contracts stated that UPS would pick up the mail and submit electronic scans to USPS with reports on expected delivery times. The DOJ says the contract explicitly highlighted that any irregularities in the deliveries, whether the packages be late or sent to the wrong destination, UPS would be fined.

According to the DOJ, the settlement resolves allegations that scans submitted by UPS falsely reported these delivery times.