Fedex drivers are contract drivers. They aren't "employees" -- they're contractors. I believe they're paid by the piece. They're not paid by the hour or the mile. So they have quite a bit of incentive to try to get you to meet them in town. It cuts into their profit margin to deliver to you if they have to go out of their way to do it.
I get those "will you meet me in town" calls too. I flat refuse. Their contract includes delivering to me, even though I may be at the end of a long road. It is part of their agreement with Fedex and if they get stuck with a package that needs to be delivered to the back end of nowhere, oh well ... I paid for delivery specifically because I DON'T want to drive into town. I refuse to take 2-3 hours (and I am not making money when I'm driving -- I make a living selling stuff on eBay) and $$ gas money to drive 80 miles round trip into town. If they don't like the contract they have with Fedex, they can find another job.
I'm probably not popular with the Fedex drivers because I call and complain Each. And. Every. Time. when they're late, they report they couldn't find the place, they report no one was home when I was actually there, etc. etc. I had one driver tell me he'd deliver on Monday and then come to find out they don't -- ever -- deliver on Mondays up here. (Huh?)
I've had a Fedex supervisor assure me that they are absolutely not supposed to call and ask you to meet them in town. It's against their policy.
And then despite being told they don't -- ever -- deliver on Mondays, I got a delivery on Monday this week. It was a printer that I'd paid for two day delivery on, which should have arrived Saturday, and had been "on the truck" since Friday. As best I can figure out, the driver didn't want to drive in the rain we had Saturday, so he snuck in a delivery on Monday. Boo flipping hoo. If he wasn't going to do his deliveries on Saturday due to bad weather (which was not all that bad -- lots of rain and lightning, but that's normal for every summer day up here), at least he could have dropped it off first thing Sunday and not waited until Monday. (I was waiting on a new printer and I ended up missing our mail carrier because they didn't deliver the printer until after the mail carrier came by. I couldn't print my postage for my eBay orders.)
Sorry to sound a bit angry, but I HATE FedEx.
I love my USPS mail carrier and I have zero issues with UPS. The UPS driver is the same driver each time, she's paid by the hour and not be the piece so she doesn't mind driving up here, and she says she enjoys the drive out here. (It's a very scenic drive -- people drive the road to our place just for fun all the time. We get a lot of service people who are delighted to come up here because it's such a nice area and they see often see elk and deer on the way.)
ETA: I report issues I have with FedEx to the sellers, too, particularly other eBay sellers. (Many sellers who live in the city aren't aware of just how bad FedEx can be for people who live in the country.) I know one very large eBay seller has started offering UPS as an option specifically because of an issue I had with FedEx -- it took a week for an order to get delivered to me that should only have taken two days. NOT her fault, but I thought she needed to know, because another buyer who wasn't aware that it's a Fedex issue, not a seller issue, could have negged her for it.
