Dear Mr. Sage,
I love the quality of your plants so much that I have shared cuttings with friends and family, including my mother who lives in another state. Recently, I wanted to order some plants from your catalog for my mom. But your website rejected her address and said that Flowers by the Sea can't ship there. Is that true?

Thanks,
Flipping Over Shipping

Dear Flipping Over Shipping,
We are really sorry for the inconvenience you recently experienced. The answer is that your request most likely stumbled on a glitch that sometimes occurs in even the best of shipping systems. I am confident that we can deliver to your mom's address unless it is somewhere highly unusual that a UPS truck can't reach.

Sometimes the UPS computer addressing system connected to our shopping cart rejects a destination due to an address being in a format that is a little different than the UPS system expects.

On the rare occasion that this occurs, I always gladly run the address in question through the UPS system manually to see what is causing the problem. Then I contact you and let you know whether and how it can be fixed.

In a worst case scenario, if the system continues to reject the address, you may tell our shopping cart to ship the plants to your address and then give us the actual shipping address in the Customer Notes section of the cart. Then we will talk with UPS and find a way to adjust any difference in shipping charge.

We pride ourselves on meeting customer needs even for destinations outside the lower 48 states of the U.S. That often requires a special shipping certificate about meeting plant sanitation standards as well as working with purchasers to make sure they understand what permits and steps are necessary at their end.

Here is some extra information about FBTS shipping charges. We believe in going out of our way for you. So please contact us with any problems.

Thanks for Your Question,
Mr. Sage

Ask Mr. Sage is a question-and-answer feature based on topics raised in calls and emails that Flowers by the Sea receives. To send a query, just click on the Ask Mr. Sage button on this page.