What's the right thing to do?

[Foschi Exotic Serpents]

IMO, my customers are paying for a live snake. I won't ship if I can't guarantee live arrival (too hot, too cold, storm, holiday,address outside of 10:30am delivery area,ect). But that doesn't make a DOA impossible. And if it happens, I owe the buyer a refund or replacement, even if it's the carrier's mistake. If I don't want to have the risk of the refund coming out of my pocket due to carrier error, I use the SYR insurance. I 've read a few TOS that seem to void the live arrival guarantee in the event of a carrier error/delay, and that seems silly. If you are shipping a healthy animal, and you do everything right, the most likely cause of a DOA is some type of carrier error. I understand it probably isn't the seller's fault, but it's not the buyer's fault either, so why should it come out of their pocket?

Fedex can make mistakes. It isn't something we can prevent 100% no matter how hard we try. I don't want to go to far off topic, but I just want to add a caution about signature required. I don't ever use it, instead I have my customers contact me within a designated amount of time after delivery. Why? I've had packages sent to me signature required. I was sitting there waiting for the truck (I could see the driveway the whole time), 10:30am came and went, no package. Checked the tracking, and the driver had put a note that no one was available to sign. But in reality he never attempted delivery, just put that note in there to avoid it. I've had this happen more than once, fortunately not with anything living, so I don't have much faith in that service.

I do agree with you, and believe me, I would not refuse some sort of compensation in the event of a DOA. I'm simply saying this is rare and should never happen. When shipping/packing properly, and following all the rules, in the end it's likely the carriers fault if there is a DOA. In that case, compensation should be made even though there would likely be a wait while the reason for the DOA is researched.

A good reason to use SYR in my opinion. Robyn and his team are good at researching these issues and getting something done about it.

Definitely get photos right away to prove the DOA. There have been scammers who claimed their animal died but would not provide proof.