discussion Royal Mail.

[Tim Marlow]

Royal Mail have always been prompt, courteous, and easy to deal with in my experience.

Interestingly I’ve had many issues with the “other” carriers. in particular, FedEx and Hermes service I’ve found to be execrable. We’ve had failed deliveries when we’ve been in, lost items, very late items, and parcels left out in the rain, despite having a porch with a door where there can be left completely in the dry (as previously instructed). One delivery of plants, for which my wife paid a premium for 24 hour delivery, came about ten days later. It should have been fruit trees, but had been in the van so long it was basically kindling. Contacting them to complain or rearranging delivery has also been awful because they are so difficult to deal with. The modus operandi of their call centre staff seems to be stall as long as you can and when the complainer finally loses their temper, hang up on them.

Now, when I buy mail order, which is frequently, I try to make sure it’s brought by a courier I trust (usually RM). I’ve not had a red card for a failed delivery from them since I moved here about four and half years ago. In fact, I don’t even know where my local sorting office is.

These days, if I do get issues with a courier I take it straight back to the vendor of the item in the hope that repeated issues will prompt them to pick someone better.

 

[Waspie]

Royal Mail have always been prompt, courteous, and easy to deal with in my experience.

Interestingly I’ve had many issues with the “other” carriers. in particular, FedEx and Hermes service I’ve found to be execrable. We’ve had failed deliveries when we’ve been in, lost items, very late items, and parcels left out in the rain, despite having a porch with a door where there can be left completely in the dry (as previously instructed). One delivery of plants, for which my wife paid a premium for 24 hour delivery, came about ten days later. It should have been fruit trees, but had been in the van so long it was basically kindling. Contacting them to complain or rearranging delivery has also been awful because they are so difficult to deal with. The modus operandi of their call centre staff seems to be stall as long as you can and when the complainer finally loses their temper, hang up on them.

Now, when I buy mail order, which is frequently, I try to make sure it’s brought by a courier I trust (usually RM). I’ve not had a red card for a failed delivery from them since I moved here about four and half years ago. In fact, I don’t even know where my local sorting office is.

These days, if I do get issues with a courier I take it straight back to the vendor of the item in the hope that repeated issues will prompt them to pick someone better.

It's very possible geographical Tim. Portland mail office has never been 100%. I've lived here for nigh on 55 years now and they're not the greatest. I have seen others complain about the other couriers and indeed had a few problems with one or two but not on the scale of Royal Mail errors.

 

[Tim Marlow]

Pretty sure it is. My daughter lives in London and to get a Xmas card to her on time you’d probably have to send it in October :smiling:

 

[Gary MacKenzie]

As someone who lies in the countryside in a part of the UK that gets terrible service levels from almost every service industry. here are the positives I find with parcels delivered by Royal Mail

1. the track and trace app/website works
2. a parcel sent anywhere in the UK to my house costs exactly the same money for the same level of service.
2a. 48 hours delivery is 48 hours delivery max.
3. a non-deliverable parcel (due to signature requirement and no one home) results in a card left in the letter box and ability to collect from whatever time is stated on the card.

No, Royal Mail are not perfect, but they and Amazon work as a far better team than any other delivery system up here

other services ( e.g. Evri ( the delivery guy is good , the service time is shocking )

1. track n trace is a gamble ( most of the time it updates only after delivery )
2. it costs me a lot more to get a parcel sent here , than it does for me to send in the opposite direction.
2a. 48 hour delivery is the time it takes to get to the local depot ...... the local depot is in Dundee , a mere 142 miles away , Hermes/Evri do not do 48 hour delivery North of Edinburgh.
3. a non deliverable parcel results in an inability to arrange redelivery as the person delivering didn't leave any notification.
3a. parcels get delivered , no photo taken, and claims by Evri of delivery at 9pm ..... i live up a road that any vehicle needs lights on to travel up , and as we are at the corner at the top of a hill , we see all car lights light up our front of house/garden.
The local driver knows us and often apologises for the ''incorrect info supplied by the depot'' when parcels location are queried.

Many of the bigger companies dont have vehicles up here and use local delivery services for ''final mile''