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On their recent Alaskan adventure, a Tennessee couple spent $1,850 on an engraved mammoth tusk to commemorate the trip. But by the time United Parcel Service delivered the delicate artwork to their home, UPS had smashed it. Even worse, UPS quickly denied all responsibility and rejected the insurance claim.
For its part, UPS says it doesn’t ship or insure the type of artwork that the family sent from Alaska. That’s a stance the couple finds awfully strange, given their insurance receipt for the tusk, issued by the company.
Now with their special souvenir ruined and the money spent on it gone, these troubled travelers are asking for help.
Will they be left with a box of shattered artwork to remember Alaska or does UPS owe them $1,850?
Let’s find out.
A graduation promise leads to an Alaskan road trip
Paul and Jeanie Hester made a promise to their three children. Each child would earn a vacation to the destination of their choice upon college graduation – courtesy of mom and dad.
When Paul Jr. graduated from the University of Tennessee this year, he chose Alaska to celebrate with his parents.
Paul Jr and his mom spent hours planning their road trip through The Last Frontier. The family finally settled on an itinerary that would begin and end in Anchorage, covering nearly 1,000 miles.
“We were celebrating Paul’s graduation, but this was also a bucket list trip for my wife and me,” Hester explained. “We always wanted to go to Alaska and this was the perfect way to see it.”
Choosing a unique piece of artwork as an Alaskan souvenir
Hester says when the family rolled into Homer, Alaska, they stopped in an artisan shop. Paul and Jeannie had been on the look-out for a special souvenir to bring home from their bucket list adventure.
After browsing through the store for some time, they kept coming back to the same display case.
“We were drawn to this fossilized mammoth tusk. It had a scene of a herd of the animals sketched onto the front,” Hester explained. “The store owners told me that the $1,850 cost included insurance and shipping. She assured me that they shipped these pieces all the time through the local UPS Store.”
Staring at the striking one-of-a-kind piece, Hester and his wife imagined it on display at their home. It would always remind them of their once-in-a-lifetime trip to Alaska.
“We were sold,” Hester recalled. “We paid for the tusk and the store owners told us they would take care of the rest.”
Entrusting the shop to get their delicate, thousands-of-years old fossil safely back to Tennessee was a giant leap of faith.
It would turn out to be a leap the couple definitely shouldn’t have taken.
Surprise! UPS is at the door with your smashed souvenir of Alaska
The Hesters finished their trip to Alaska and returned to Tennessee. They looked forward to the arrival of their new mammoth tusk. The day before their souvenir was scheduled for delivery, they debated where best it should be displayed.
Of course, we know now they wouldn’t need to worry about displaying it at all.
The next day, a UPS driver brought the box containing the mammoth tusk to their front porch. One look at the box, and they knew something had gone terribly wrong.
“Part of the display stand was piercing the outside of the box,” Hester told me.
Despite the “Fragile” and “Handle with Care” stickers, the package clearly had not been treated with care.
Disappointed by the failure of UPS to deliver their Alaska souvenir, the couple took comfort in the fact that insurance would cover this loss.
And then UPS failed the Hesters for a second time.
UPS: “Your insurance claim is denied. You shipped a prohibited item.”
Just days after filing their insurance claim, UPS gave the couple the bad news.
Unfortunately, after a thorough investigation, we are unable to approve the claim because this type of merchandise is excluded by UPS’s limitation of liability according to the UPS Tariff and Terms and Conditions.
Based on our investigation, your shipment contained items that UPS does not accept for transportation.
UPS Capital
Hester was momentarily taken aback. The artisan shop owners had told him that they ship this kind of artwork all the time. He quickly dialed the number provided at the bottom of his insurance claim denial to get to the bottom of this confusion. The couple assumed this rejection was the result of a misunderstanding of what was in the box.
It wasn’t.
“UPS told me the woolly mammoth tusk is ivory,” Hester told me. “UPS doesn’t allow the shipment of any kind of ivory.”
If UPS doesn’t allow the shipment of ivory, then why had it sold him insurance for the package? Now it was Hester’s turn to be baffled.
What is Scrimshaw and why it is controversial artwork
The full description of the artwork the Hesters bought is “Woolly Mammoth Scrimshaw on Fossil Mammoth Ivory.”
Scrimshaw is the art of carving intricate scenes onto the ivory tusks and teeth of (mostly) marine mammals like walruses and whales. There is more than a bit of controversy surrounding scrimshaw because of the use of ivory and the fact that it originally spun out of the, now highly controversial, whaling industry.
The Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act, made it illegal to sell or import scrimshaw made from the teeth and tusks of protected animals. Note: There are still some circumstances where the products made from marine ivory can be sold, depending on the age and origin of the piece.
Of course, having been extinct for over 4,000 years, woolly mammoths are not protected mammals.
Scrimshaw on a fossilized tusk doesn’t endanger any living species. However, laws and policies making it illegal to ship and own ivory-based art don’t always exclude mammoth tusks. Many states in the U.S. prohibit owning or importing any type of ivory, mammoth tusks included.
Tennessee isn’t one of the states that strictly prohibits owning an ivory mammoth tusk. However, despite what the shop told the Hesters about regularly shipping these scrimshaws, UPS forbids it.
Consumer Rescue investigates: Who should make these travelers whole?
When Hester reached out to me, it had been two months since UPS had smashed his scrimshaw mammoth tusk. Unsure of what to do with it, the fossil was still sitting in pieces in the beat-up box it arrived in.
He was at his wits’ end.
“The [artisan] shop tells me to work it out with the local UPS store,” Hester told me. “The UPS store tells me to talk with the shop about my options.”
Hester’s options, as far as the shop was concerned, had nothing to do with them. The couple found themselves in an endless loop of finger-pointing and all they had to show for it was an $1,850 box of junk.
“Can you help me?” Hester pleaded. “I would just like to be made whole and be repaid the money I paid for the product UPS destroyed during shipment.”
As I do, I asked for the paper trail and Hester sent it right over.
To determine who owed this couple a refund, I needed to answer one critical question: Did the UPS Store know exactly what was in that box — or did the artisan shop quietly hand over a wrapped ivory tusk and ask to insure the package’s value for $1,850?
The shipping receipt from UPS contains the answer
The answer to my question was plain as day on UPS’s shipping receipt for the item.
The receipt clearly shows that the local UPS Store itself wrapped the mammoth ivory tusk before sending it on its way. Of course, we don’t know why the packaging failed to protect the delicate fossil; however, insufficient wrapping certainly could be the culprit.
But beyond the wrapping, the receipt reveals an even bigger problem for the local UPS Store.
The employee who prepared this receipt and issued the high-value insurance names exactly what is being insured: a mammoth ivory tusk. This UPS Store wrapped and insured a piece of ivory artwork.
UPS handlers did not take care with the fragile package. The over 4,000-year-old fossil, with the beautiful scene an artist spent countless hours carving, was destroyed. What was meant to be a family heirloom holding treasured memories of a trip to Alaska now represented memories of a decidedly different kind.
A UPS Store franchise makes a mistake. So who pays?
Most UPS Store locations are franchised. That means they are independently owned and operated.
Hester was getting nowhere with the local UPS Store that had issued the insurance and shipped his Alaskan souvenir. The owner, understandably, didn’t want to shoulder an $1,850 mistake and was hoping that the artisan shop would repair or replace the scrimshaw UPS had smashed.
That wasn’t going to happen. The pieces that the store sells are each one-of-a-kind. The owners weren’t about to “eat” a nearly $2,000 loss and send a similar tusk to the Hesters. And Hester didn’t even consider a “repair” of his shattered artwork as a reasonable resolution.
“At this point, I just want a refund,” Hester told the UPS shop owner. “I don’t want someone trying to repair this. I want my money back.”
Suddenly, Hester received a refund from the local UPS Store – but only for the insurance and shipping fee. That still left him with a nearly $1,700 loss.
I always like to give a business a chance to correct a problem on its own. But in this case, despite the evidence that his shop had made a mistake that ultimately had jeopardized nearly $2,000 of his customer’s cash. The owner of the UPS franchise appeared to think a refund for the shipping, packaging and insurance would make things right.
He was wrong.
Asking UPS to honor the insurance it issued for the destroyed package
I reached out to our executive contacts at UPS and explained what happened to the Hesters and their package. I asked that the insurance company reverse the clain or local outlet be responsible to pay for its mistake.
After a short investigation, our executive contact at UPS confirmed that the local outlet conceded it had made a mistake. As a result, it would reimburse the Hesters for the ruined mammoth tusk.
Hester received a direct deposit for the full cost of his smashed Alaskan souvenir from the UPS Store in Homer. He immediately shipped the remains of the tusk back to Alaska.
Michelle,
Thank you for making this possible.
We really doubted we’d see a refund the way it kept dragging along for well over 2 months. Once I discovered you and [Consumer Rescue] and you got involved, it has progressed in a very timely manner. We cannot thank you enough.
Paul Hester
You’re very welcome, Paul. I guess the only thing you can do now is go back to Alaska and have another family adventure to look for another epic souvenir! Pro-tip: Make sure you can ship your Alaskan souvenir home OR carry it with you.
Traveler alert: Be careful about those souvenir purchases
Travelers must be aware that the ability to purchase unique items abroad doesn’t necessarily mean they should buy them. There are restrictions, regulations, and ethical considerations for many souvenirs you might see on your global adventures.
Here’s what to consider before making an expensive souvenir purchase abroad:
- What is the souvenir made of?
- Am I allowed to buy and bring it home with me (or ship it)?
- Are any permits required to buy or ship this?
- Are there ethical concerns I should know about purchasing this item?
If you don’t know the answer to those questions, purchasing the product is unwise.
Case in point: I was recently on an Aurora Expedition from Norway to Greenland. When we landed in Ittoqqortoormiit on the east coast, there was a small gift shop the locals were operating.
There was an artisan proudly selling slippers made of polar bear skin/fur. They looked fluffy and warm. But it’s illegal to bring something like that back to the United States. (FYI: We were alerted by Aurora and the gift shop that we could not purchase polar bear skin slippers.)
The bottom line
There is no doubt that souvenir shopping is a fun part of traveling. Don’t let an unwise choice of memorabilia ruin the memories of your vacation. Do your research. Ensure that you can buy the itemd and legally ship it home, and that you’ll feel good showing the item to friends and family.
Of course, if you do all of the above and still end up with a rejected insurance claim, you know Consumer Rescue is here to protect you. Send your request for assistance to our team, and we’ll be happy to investigate your situation. If the facts are on your side, we’ll mediate your case with the company. Our help is always fast, friendly, and free of charge! (Michelle Couch-Friedman, founder of Consumer Rescue)
