For computer parts (Toshiba, in my case)? Are you serious?
Having worked for a business that coordinated the repair of goods (i.e. we take customers' faulty goods and coordinate with repairers), yes. Some suppliers just don't do any other delivery method except what they are used to, whether it be regular post or regular courier. (This was in the days when regular post meant 2 business days between state capitals rather than double now, but still). For those that offered a chance to expedite (we'd check their website or ask), we made the request (through the repairer) and so it did happen (we even intervened to coordinate, e.g. arrange for the express postage via a local branch, or organise an express courier), but otherwise we sometimes were left reporting back to the customer why it was taking so long to source a part.
When you add things like part backorders (especially motherboards), that doesn't help a single bit, particularly when the part supplier (supplying the repairer) is definitely
not going to demand expedited delivery of the backordered part from the upchain supplier.
What was worse was when the supplier of the part didn't even expedite their own in-house processes to get the part to the repairer as fast as they could, e.g. you could place an order for a part today, wait until nearly COB tomorrow for the part to be confirmed and then it only leaves their warehouse on the third or fourth day.
Since the mobs that supplied these parts were often the only practical/reasonable, or even
the only, choice in the country, there was little choice that could be made in choosing another supplier. These kinds of things had us hamstrung with not much we could do to speed things along.
