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Deliveries App Loses Functionality as Shipping Companies Refuse to Participate
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For the record, you REALLY don't have to do anything.
You choose to.
Gotta say, life must be peachy if you have the time to watch that much content.
Aren't they accessing the same shipping company APIs though? Wouldn't Parcel be equally affected by this - otherwise, why wouldn't Deliveries just switch to doing things the way Parcel does it?
Hmmm, I've been using Deliveries since roughly forever when it was still a widget... Since it seems to be losing the functionality I was paying for -- the convenience of just glancing at one app to get status of all packages, because I don't want to open 3 web pages or 7 different apps -- I guess it's time to say goodbye.
How do you export the entire archive? I seem to be missing something, it only exports individual entries, I'd like to just place everything that ever went through it into a file.
Thanks for any insights!
How do you export the entire archive? I seem to be missing something, it only exports individual entries, I'd like to just place everything that ever went through it into a file.
Thanks for any insights!
Wonder if it will affect them too?
I mean they have the $$$ to spread around to shipping companies that is for sure.
apps.apple.com
I mean they have the $$$ to spread around to shipping companies that is for sure.
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Sure.
Ignore ongoing costs.
Then extrapolate to 10 years.
Then tell them how much they should charge.
Go ahead.
Pixie dust.
I use Parcel and I love it. But I'm worried they'll have to run into same issue, no?
Good
Package tracking app Deliveries is losing functionality because shipping companies are not willing to provide the shipping data that the app needs to work, according to developer Mike Piontek.
In a blog post penned earlier this week, Piontek said that Deliveries is no longer able to maintain the same service that it used to provide because it relies on shipping companies, and "without their help" the app is not able to work the way that customers expect.
In time, the Deliveries app will likely stop showing direct tracking information in the app for additional services. Delivery date, map route, and other details will not be available, nor will notifications about status changes. To see tracking information, customers will need to use the "View Online" button to see tracking information on the shipping company's website.
According to Piontek, Deliveries understands that the app will become less useful to users, but the Deliveries team will aim to keep making it as useful as possible for those who continue to use it.
At the current time, Deliveries seems to be able to show shipping information from major U.S. shipping companies like the United States Postal Service and UPS, but over the course of the last few months, Amazon deliveries have stopped working.
Deliveries used to be able to track Amazon shipments just from an order link, but that is no longer possible. Tracking either does not work, or it requires logging in to Amazon with a login and password, which is a hassle. The app also recently stopped working with FedEx tracking numbers, and there are also complaints about DHL shipments not being able to be tracked.
Prior to when these changes were made by shipping companies, Deliveries was a very useful package tracking app, but for many, it may no longer be worth the $4.99 per year subscription price.
Article Link: Deliveries App Loses Functionality as Shipping Companies Refuse to Participate
Are you a developer for them?
Which sucks because the whole idea was to have a single place to track everything.
Yes. Extrapolate what it will cost and charge accordingly. If you mess up you go bankrupt. It's called risk, and developers have discovered they transfer risk to the customer by charging a subscription instead. If they don't add features or perform updates then it's profit, but if their business strategy doesn't include forecasting, then they won't be around very long.
As opposed to charging a subscription and then not refunding your customers when you can no longer provide the service you sold them?
Agreeing to pay for something in perpetuity feels crappy. I understand devs need to be paid, and I understand development today is not like it was 30 years ago when software was sold boxed in a store. But I cannot help it that whenever I see "just $3/month" I immediately think "$2,500 for the rest of my life, assuming no price increases."
Calm down. It's been a damn useful app and for $5 a year (41 whole cents a month), I've been able to put all my household's incoming and outgoing packages in one place -- and because they run their own sync service I've been able to make it sync to my wife's devices as well as my own.
You don't think that's a service? Fine, don't pay for it. Buy another app or track all your **** through multiple websites. Enjoy. But as someone who does pay a tiny tiny amount of money for this app, I think it's a service.
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Shorter:
You do not understand the concept of ongoing business costs do you?
Longer:
I charged 99cents for my app TEN YEARS AGO.
WHY GOD OF OLYMPUS did I GO OUT OF bizness??????
WHyyyyy!!!!
To be fair, this kind of app does require a lot of ongoing development effort as there are literally thousands of delivery companies and so they have to not just investigate all of those to find them but also get examples of packages sent through those shippers to examine their delivery pages so that they can scrape the content accurately.
Now to me that's not worth $2.99 per month. It's worth maybe $1 per month. But I guess it's relative, how many packages you have shipped to you on a regular basis etc
For other kinds of apps that are very self contained (like a word processor) I feel a monthly subscription is not the right way to go. I feel it should only really apply to apps that are essentially services that require constant developer maintenance to make them at all useful and functional.
I love Parcel, it works well with Amazon (need to relogin monthly or so) as well as the regular services. It is lovely having it all in one app. (It even has a scan option so you don't have to type the or even copy the tracking number). BUT I assume that it too will be doomed if the shipping services have decided to make life harder for us.
I've been using Parcel for years and pay for it. The developer is a nice guy, always replies to emails, and he mentioned to me on why sometimes he can't do live updates on the app itself to reflect what's online if you visit the shipper's website. To put it simply they don't allow the devs to hit their api continuously they have to wait x amount of time, so there's only so much they can do. It's something I'm willing to live with considering it's not the devs fault.
This is the fundamental problem with app developers as a full-time business. They make one app and expect to be paid forever for it. The fact that 20% of app developers don't go bankrupt each year shows that this model is already skewed. Business diversify. Make a package tracking app. Make a game. Make an app that tracks stars, whatever. But don't expect customers to pay for a service that doesn't even do the same thing it did when they first downloaded it.
Where did you get $2.99 a month? Deliveries is $5 a year.
Deliveries is my to go app whenever I need to track a package. Sorry to see the big players squeezing it out of the market. Not cool. I use deliveries for general tracking, then some of the specific shipment companies if I need more granular tracking on delivery day. There are many companies, unfortunately, that provided a great service at the beginning of the smartphone revolution, but that have been pushed out by apps provided by the major platforms. For example Tile, that has been superseded by AirTags from Apple. AirTags deliver on the promises that Tile never did for me (leaving something behind notifications on Tile were a paid subscription premium feature, etc.). Video conferencing apps, etc. I used Skype quite a bit years ago, but now I can use FaceTime or WhatsApp more easily, etc. However, deliveries still serves a purpose. There is no app I can think of that puts all of this package tracking in one place. I wish them well.