The reason your package is traveling farther away from its original destination is because of something called routing.

Routing is the process by which a package travels from one hub to another. It’s like a trip from Boston to New York: You can take a direct flight or you can go through Chicago or Philadelphia on your way there.

The first step in routing is determining how far away a package should be routed from its origin. This is done by looking at the shipping time and cost, as well as the efficiency of delivery. If it’s cheaper to ship my package through Los Angeles than through San Francisco, then my item will be routed through Los Angeles instead of San Francisco.

Once we have our routing plan figured out, we look at all of the possible routes between our source and destination points (also known as “hubs”). We then choose which one will be best based on those same metrics (cost and speed).

The last step in the process happens when an item arrives at its destination hub and needs to be transferred to another hub for delivery to its final destination. This transfer may happen within that same facility or it might involve sending it somewhere else altogether (like UPS Worldport in Kentucky).

Last modified: October 11, 2022