Royal mail/local post office - NEED TO VENT!!

[arieliwish]

Hi guys,

Sorry but I need to vent!

My aunt is 60 today (she came to DLRP with our large group last week) and as a special birthday gift I had an old photo booth photo of her and my mum (her sister) cleaned up and enlarged, it was taken in 1966 when my mum was 22 and my aunt was 20, my mum died almost 4 years ago and there's no other brothers or sisters.

I had a stress on thurs collecting the photo, shop in town had enlarged it without fixing the scratches and cracks - WHY WOULD I WANT THAT??? I asked the lady in my own subtle annoyed way! Well, eventually they sorted it and I collected it after 5pm, DH gave it to his mum to post for me yesterday as I was working, at our local post office. Next day delivery is for Mon - Fri and would cost over £7. As I wanted gauranteed saturday delivery it was an extra £2 - fine as that's what I wanted. So MIL paid £9.40 and got receipt for gauranteed delivery by 1pm today.

As my aunt hadn't called by 3pm, I called her and no parcel had been delivered. I checked on the royal mail website and it says parcel is on its way and will be delivered by its gauranteed date - monday at 1pm.

No customer service available at royal mail after half 2 and can't find email link on their site.

I'm so disappointed after all the hassle and effort getting it and actually paying for it to be delivered definately today, and it won't get there til monday. If I'd known that I would have taken it over the A66 to cumbria myself today, just a 2 hour drive.

The really annoying thing is royal mail will probably refund my postage costs, but that's not the point when it was meant for a special birthday as a gift that really means a lot.

I really could cry with frustration, and I can't even vent at royal mail til monday.

Thanks for listening,

Lynn

 

[CustardTart]

I really feel for you. I've had several problems with Royal Mail recently to do with returns and they have been less than helpful...

 

[alisonbestford]

Hi Lynn

All I can say is try not to upset yourself too much about their inadequacies

I had problems with Royal Mail trying to get a parcel to DD when she was travelling.
They were pretty useless and I eventually had to resort to the local newspaper to resolve the problem ......!

By all means complain to them and let everyone know how much they have let you down but, at the end of the day, the parcel is safe and it's precious contents will, eventually, arrive at your Aunts' for her to thoroughly enjoy

Alison

 

[Cyrano]

I feel for you. I've found that local post office advise that if you don't post till late afternoon that next delivery is unlikely, which is understandable

 

[mandymouse]

Oh dear, that is so annoying. Unfortunately we hear this kind of story far too often especially when we are holding our 'Secret Exchanges', where people pay for recorded delivery and the postman just leaves it on the door step. I hope she gets her present tomorrow and that she loves it

 

[wils]

i am sorry

It will be worth waiting for when she sees it tomorrow

 

[Minniespal]

I've no faith in our postage system. Usually I am pleasantly surprised when something actually does arrive

I would certainly complain to them ~ It will all be worthwhile though when the parcel arrives with your Aunt.

 

[pokemon_master]

I am so sorry to hear about your bad times. By all means complain at them!

I hope things turn out OK eventually.

 

[MrsJobba1]

Hi,

The post office is terrible and I really know how you feel.

3 weeks ago my DH had a big NHS conference in Birmingham (Thurs - Sun). He had a tradestand so he went with all his things and set up. Friday morning delegates went round and he gave away more brochures than he expected so he called his brother to send another box of 100 down for the sat morning - now the value of these was around £500. We paid £58 extra for them to deliver @ his hotel before 9am. Needless to say they didn't arrive.

They tried to deliver them on the following Monday but the hotel thankfully refused them - we are still in dispute with them for compensation.

 

[Cyrano]

I've no faith in our postage system. Usually I am pleasantly surprised when something actually does arrive

Have to say the opposite. In all my times of personal mail and ebay parcels only every had one item sent which arrived damaged.

 

[arieliwish]

Thanks guys,

I've always had good things to say about royal mail, and thinking about it more I wonder if it's our local post office that's made the error - royal mail website states 'next day delivery' and 'SPECIAL saturday delivery' as two seperate things, the PO used a standard next day delivery label and wrote in 4/11/06 as delivery date, so maybe they should have used a different label to show saturday delivery??! I'm going to call them first tomorrow morning and see where I get before I contact royal mail.

Will let you know what happens,

Lynn

 

[Cyrano]

Hope you get to the bottom of it Lynn

 

[natalielongstaff]

Have to say the opposite. In all my times of personal mail and ebay parcels only every had one item sent which arrived damaged.

i have been VERY lucky with royal mail ....so far

im sorry you have had problems hope the birthday went well

 

[Laurafoster]

I dont usually get issues with Royal Mail but i did have a rather stupid problem with them last week. It was a friends birthday last week and because i was without a car i decided to post the present to them instead of taking it round. Now i live in the same town as my friend - both have the same local post office.

I posted the parcel - recorded delivery - the parcel never turned up. So i went down to complain and their excuse was that the parcel had been lost by the delivery post office. When i said but that would still be you - their faces were a picture! I wa\s given a refund which was fine as i went out and got the same present again to give to her. I got home yesterday to find the original parcel on MY doorstep with an apology note saying they were unable to locate the delivery address?!

 

[ariel75]

Hi guys,

Sorry but I need to vent!

My aunt is 60 today (she came to DLRP with our large group last week) and as a special birthday gift I had an old photo booth photo of her and my mum (her sister) cleaned up and enlarged, it was taken in 1966 when my mum was 22 and my aunt was 20, my mum died almost 4 years ago and there's no other brothers or sisters.

I had a stress on thurs collecting the photo, shop in town had enlarged it without fixing the scratches and cracks - WHY WOULD I WANT THAT??? I asked the lady in my own subtle annoyed way! Well, eventually they sorted it and I collected it after 5pm, DH gave it to his mum to post for me yesterday as I was working, at our local post office. Next day delivery is for Mon - Fri and would cost over £7. As I wanted gauranteed saturday delivery it was an extra £2 - fine as that's what I wanted. So MIL paid £9.40 and got receipt for gauranteed delivery by 1pm today.

As my aunt hadn't called by 3pm, I called her and no parcel had been delivered. I checked on the royal mail website and it says parcel is on its way and will be delivered by its gauranteed date - monday at 1pm.

No customer service available at royal mail after half 2 and can't find email link on their site.

I'm so disappointed after all the hassle and effort getting it and actually paying for it to be delivered definately today, and it won't get there til monday. If I'd known that I would have taken it over the A66 to cumbria myself today, just a 2 hour drive.

The really annoying thing is royal mail will probably refund my postage costs, but that's not the point when it was meant for a special birthday as a gift that really means a lot.

I really could cry with frustration, and I can't even vent at royal mail til monday.

Thanks for listening,

Lynn

hi did the parcel arrive yesterday?

 

[alisonbestford]

I dont usually get issues with Royal Mail but i did have a rather stupid problem with them last week. It was a friends birthday last week and because i was without a car i decided to post the present to them instead of taking it round. Now i live in the same town as my friend - both have the same local post office.

I posted the parcel - recorded delivery - the parcel never turned up. So i went down to complain and their excuse was that the parcel had been lost by the delivery post office. When i said but that would still be you - their faces were a picture! I wa\s given a refund which was fine as i went out and got the same present again to give to her. I got home yesterday to find the original parcel on MY doorstep with an apology note saying they were unable to locate the delivery address?!

 

[Lizzy Lemon]

Unfortunately you cannot blame royal mail as such for a postman leaving a parcel on the doorstep (I know they're not supposed to, they are told not to) that is the actions of a lazy postman. On the plus side there are brilliant postmen, one of which is my DH, with permission from certain customers he will put parcels in garages or whereever else they may suggest to save them having to trek down to the sorting office (only if they don't need signing for). You have to admit a lot of delivery companies do the same thing. We had a laptop computer left with neighbours (who we hardly know)last week without a note being put through the door just a follow up phone call. We had no proof he had tried to deliver it. Hope your aunt got her gift.

 

[arieliwish]

Unfortunately you cannot blame royal mail as such for a postman leaving a parcel on the doorstep (I know they're not supposed to, they are told not to) that is the actions of a lazy postman. On the plus side there are brilliant postmen, one of which is my DH, with permission from certain customers he will put parcels in garages or whereever else they may suggest to save them having to trek down to the sorting office (only if they don't need signing for). You have to admit a lot of delivery companies do the same thing. We had a laptop computer left with neighbours (who we hardly know)last week without a note being put through the door just a follow up phone call. We had no proof he had tried to deliver it. Hope your aunt got her gift.

I think the point was it was RETURNED TO SENDER's doorstep as they were unable to find DELIVERY address!!

Yes my aunt finally got her parcel yesterday morning and her postie told her it was late and she should contact me to claim the postage back! She loved it and I think had a few tears when she opened it. She said she had a great birthday on saturday, and this has prolonged it for her, so that's good, she did know I had really wanted it to get to her on saturday.

I did call Royal Mail who said as I must have written the post code incorrectly (!) it got sent to Chester mail office - CH instead of CA! As I'm from Cumbria originally I don't think my CA resembles CH at all, and I've never had anything else ever go there!

Anyway what else could be done?? She said to post the receipt to her and they will refund my money, so that's an end to the matter I suppose. I will be wary of trusting next day delivery though, mental note to leave an extra day in between next time!!

Thanks for all your thoughts,

Lynn

 

[mandymouse]

I'm so pleased that she got her pressie and that she was thrilled with it

 

[ariel75]

Glad she got her present.