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Story of the two thousand stolen Playdate handhelds

(podcast.play.date)
173 points textadventure | 1 comments | 22 Nov 24 06:53 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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gambiting ◴[22 Nov 24 09:25 UTC] No.42212376[source]▶
The thing that surprised me the most about it is that FedEx didn't just pay them the 400k for lost shipment. They had all the proof that it was lost, all that Fedex had was a signature of someone who doesn't even work at their fulfilment centre. Even after their "higher ups" got involved all that FedEx could do was "huh, sucks to be you I guess?" Does freight shipment not have insurance? What's going on here?
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whazor ◴[22 Nov 24 11:13 UTC] No.42212856[source]▶
Shipment insurance is normally an optional add-on. IMO, if the shipper doesn’t get it, it is on them.

It is nicer for the shipper to decide the value and pay the corresponding price for that. Because you need to know the replacement value of that lost item. This is dependent on all kinds of factors.

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gambiting ◴[22 Nov 24 11:19 UTC] No.42212889[source]▶
Is there any scenario where someone would knowingly decide not to take insurance on a 400k shipment? What would be the reason for doing so?

In this case the shipper is the company behind the Playdate, so it seems weird to me they wouldn't insure their own stock. But maybe there's a good reason why this isn't done?

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1. brk ◴[22 Nov 24 14:30 UTC] No.42214100[source]▶
Package insurance is more of the exception than the norm, even for stuff like that. The insurance cost is proportionate to the value you claim, and it's not cheap (not like 10%, but still, for $400K, might be $1,000?). That cuts into margins, especially when you consider that you are expecting a global freight company to be able to globally deliver a basic freight item.