What do you think of the Royal Mail Service. Personally I think it's dreadful service and that they are nothing short of con merchants. I'll give you a example. I recently was supposed to have a parcel delivered to my home that was by recorded delivery, only the parcel never arived. I chased the parcel that according to the consignment number had been delivered somewhere...but in order to find out exactly where and who had signed for it I had to cough up another £2.20 and it would take 5 days to find out....what kind of crap is this?

Dont know about the royal mail! but I sent a birthday card with a £10 note in it, from the post office in town a distance of six miles into the suburbs.

It never arrived, so I made enquiries and discovered that the postman regularly pushed the mail through the wrong door. There was no compensation as I hadn't registered it.

Further enquiries revealed the mail for the address I sent the card to had been delivered by the person at the wrong address. Having lost ten pounds I knocked on their door to ask if it had been delivered there by mistake. It was opened by a man who denied ever receiving it, and the look in his eyes was more elequent than anything he could have said.

The laugh was that I could have pushed it through the right door myself for nothing, as I was goi :D :o :lol: ng past anyhow and it wouldn't have cost me 27pence.

Sorry halevan, but I've got no sympathy for you. A postal order would have saved you all this trouble and would have been useless if it had gotten into the wrong hands.

Originally posted by "caprice"

Sorry halevan, but I've got no sympathy for you.

That's not very nice!

i dont trust the PO anymore, ive lost 2 DVD's from them :x

both were covered by Recorded Delivery, but its the hassle of getting the money :/

I know its not nice Andy, but I have inside information from my Father! He works for the Royal Mail. Whenever there's a damaged letter, perhaps with money poking out of it, the dosh goes straight in the tin for the bosses to have nice fancy meals with etc. Its cruel not to have sympathy, but a postal order does save a hell of a lot of hassle.

I think the service is just getting worse. I have noticed that a post box near me has reduced it's collections. It only collects Mon-Fri and not as often. So, there is no collections at weekend like there used to be one on Saturday and Sunday, also the number of collections per a day in the week has been reduced. There was a note on the front of the post box stating that if I wanted something collected over the weekend I had to post it in another post box a few miles away! I may as well, deliver it myself. Call this a service? Often these days I post something first class and don't receive a first class service. I am finding more and more packages are going missing or been delivered to wrong locations, Mail gets delivered at 2pm. Just what the hell is going on? I'd like to see a rival company set up so that there is some competition.

Lickszz the answer is ECONOMY. The Post Office like every other business in this dratted country is out to save money and they are doing this by cutting service and standards simple as that. I regularly have other peoples post shoved thru my letter box and post is often delivered well into the afternoon. It can and will get worse once the effects of this governments attack on local post offices comes into full play. Encouraging / forcing people to have their benefits paid into a bank account will only further reduce the local service. :evil:

I recently sent a parcel by Parcelforce and know exactly what you mean!
The standard postage cost came with compensation included so you would think all would have been ok....sadly not! The contents of the parcel arrived minus the packaging (my dad is a postman - I know how to wrap a parcel properly!) and surprise surprise minus the card that had some gift vouchers in it.
I rang the claims line, and asked for a claim form and booklet on the steps I would need to follow to make the claim - making it blatantly obvious that I had not had to do this before. The charming lady on the phone negelected to tell me that the whole package would have to be retained for inspection - so of course they rejected my claim on the basis that I hadn't followed the guidelines! This is their way of robbing their customers and then making sure they have no recourse!

Grrrr!

parcelfarce more like...

they sent my ADSL modem to a house 7/8 streets away, to a totally different name, house number, road and postcode, luckely it was passed onto the local post office, who had to go out of their way to bring it us, and it was a day late :evil: (24 hour delivery)

Well, with my most recent experience. I was waiting for a parcel and it never game. I contacted th sender whom told me they sent it over a week ago, and that I should have got it. They chased it up for me and provided me with details which stated it had actually been signed for. Now in order to actually get a copy of the signed delivery note you are required to pay an extra fee, which I think it pathetic. Why should you pay to see prove that the goods were delivered? Anyway, after paying for the delivery note it became obvious that the signature was not mine, although the parcel had supposed to have been delivered to my address. Whoever had delivered the parcel had not even bothered asking the receiver to print their name, so there was just a unreadable signature. So, about 3 weeks later I receive a knock at the door. It was the postman with the missing parcel, apparently it had somehow got delivered to the local hospital which was nothing like my address, how can you make such an error? Luckily the people at the hospital were honest.

dont forget, you can send a letter anywhere in the country for less than the price of a mars bar. That's overnight delivery for virtually the entire country - quite a feat.

The privatisation of the post office and the breaking of the monopoly that is ultimately planned means we will be at the mercy of commercial pricing rather than a not for profit basis.

It's sad, but we will lose what was once the envy of the world in terms of an efficient, cheap and fast postal system.

Is it just our street or are they going down the tubes?

We got our post at 17.05 yesterday.

we had the post of 2 houses down stuck through our front door as they have no front letterbox (every house uses the back doors round here)

Its consistantly after 13.30 and you get your stuff a day after you should do.

One big joke...

They are getting worse. We sometimes don't get our post until the afternoon, but 5.05pm is extracting the urine! :o

its not royal mail its JOKE MAIL bet the queen get her mail in the morning

We have started collecting our mail at work otherwise its 1pm onwards which is absolute rubbish. It used to be 8.30 which was really impressive but now there is just one delivery we have been told we are halfway down the postie's pile.

I think its a general problem all over. At home its anytime between lunch and t-time.

:(

We got our mail at 16.05 in the 25 years I have lived in my house that is the latest it has ever been,the P/O is getting worse,my cousin is a Postman & I sympathise with them ,the weather they tramp around our streets in for a C**P wage & all the extra junk mail they have to carry,you would think the P/O would put some extra Posties on the routes seeing as they are shutting down post offices all over the country & saving all that extra money.

Well we were warned in a leaflet that deliveries would be later when single delivery was brought in. The latest mine has been delivered is 4pm.

I heard on the radio this morning that from 2006 the postal delivery service will be opened up to competition so we should see alternative post boxes springing up. Should be interesting to see what happens from then in.

I kinda like post coming late. means when packages come and the postman knocks (twice), its not so early that I am still in bed. at the end of the day, what MAJOR difference does it make if you read your post over the breakfast or dinner table. It still reads the same. Postmen and women are a lovely bunch of people too. Its just the agency staff who suck. We would all be complaining if the postage prices went up too, but thats whats gonna happen if you want better service.

Originally posted by robbie
Is it just our street or are they going down the tubes?

We got our post at 17.05 yesterday.



Post arrived yesterday at around 17:15!

I was online at the time and heard the letter-box clang - I thought it was someone delivering pizza leaflets as I'd long given up hope of any post!

I do feel really sorry for the poor posties though, having to cart around all that junk mail. They deserve extra money for lugging all the extra weight!

StarSparkle

Ours used to come around 0735, but now it comes at around 0945-1030.

Alex

The mail is getting worse. We seem to have a different postie every day. I think its due to the hills in Walkley. I've noticed when its your day off and you want a lay in, the postie always knocks the door really early. Sods law!

Originally posted by cazzaworld
The mail is getting worse. We seem to have a different postie every day. I think its due to the hills in Walkley. I've noticed when its your day off and you want a lay in, the postie always knocks the door really early. Sods law!

At least the postie knocks on your door - one of our regulars has *twice* opened my front door to see if there was anyone in because I didn't answer within ten seconds on him hammering on it!

First time, I gave him a mouthful. Second time my husband caught him. I really should complain, but what's the point? Royal Mail don't care about their customers - their constant decline in service proves that.

Royal Mail had the cheek to send a letter advising that they were getting rid of their second delivery during the day, where I live they've only had one delivery throughout the day for years!

Would agree with the other posts that it's not the postmen and women's fault, they were doing a fantastic job, it's the management who are to blame for the mess the RM is in. Time the Queen insisted on them removing the 'Royal' from their title, the whole company is a total disgrace.

Can't wait for the competition to come in, will mean that we will still receive a crap service wherever we post our mail, just more choice on who we wish to sh#t on us!

yeh we have been getting our post around 4-5pm too most days now. In london we always had 1 delivery a day, not two, but now that's been dropped to 3 a week! I don't mind it being late but its annoying when you are expecting something, and by the time it comes it's past 5pm so you can't ring anyone to deal with business stuff!

during the bus strike i shared a cab with a couple of (what i thought were) postmen. it turned out they were just temps, which would explain cazzaworld's different postman every day.

apparently temp agencies pay cheaper rates between 9-6, so many are just employed between those times, hence the late post.

it seems a lot of the experienced staff have been given redundancy packages. it costs less to hire someone who doesn't get holiday/sick pay and hasn't built up 30 years of annual raises, but i'd happilly pay 5p extra per stamp for the service to be as it was 10 years ago.

Got my post today at 3 in the afternoon, was suprised I got it at all. Our new postman is a convicted theif and mugger. How he got the job I don't know. Don't Royal Mail do background checks?

What I really don't understand is why the post office is loosing so much money to having to cut services. What is so different from say 20 or 30 years ago? Yes we have email now, but I really don't believe that can effect revenue that much - what about the effect of the Internet moving into the high street markets - someone has to deliver goods to consumers.

Why not get rid of second class post altogether - i.e. you would only be able to buy a 1st class stamp, surely wouldn't that raise more money?

Is this late post a Sheffield-wide thing, or just in certain areas?

I live in Hillsborough, and twice in the last couple of weeks the post has arrived after 7:00PM!!

It used to come any time between 8 and 10:30am. I don't mind it being a bit later, but for it to arrive when it's nearly getting dark is ridiculous. So what do the posties do in the day?

At least at 17h15 you get your mail, Royal Mail lost 3 of my letters last week!
It used to be that when someone said something was lost in the post you knew they were lying now it is only a percentage of the mail which actually gets delivered.
I cannot wait until there is a viable alternative to Royal Mail and the ill-mannered staff that work in post offices can all go to hell.

What about parcels? Any parcels aiming for our house get taken straight to the sorting office... humm i wonder why.. maybe its because at 2.30pm i'm not in, i'm at work! duh!

Now i get most of my post delivered to work, at least i'll be able to get it & take it home.

The sorting office is the worst place ever... they don't ever answer their phones, they are open really stupid hours and they never re-deliver it when they say they will... grrrr

Originally posted by al_partridge
Is this late post a Sheffield-wide thing, or just in certain areas?

I live in Hillsborough, and twice in the last couple of weeks the post has arrived after 7:00PM!!

It used to come any time between 8 and 10:30am. I don't mind it being a bit later, but for it to arrive when it's nearly getting dark is ridiculous. So what do the posties do in the day?

7pm is a joke. If this is the case then they are not delivering the service that they are supposed to be.

Originally posted by Mo
Well we were warned in a leaflet that deliveries would be later when single delivery was brought in. The latest mine has been delivered is 4pm.

I heard on the radio this morning that from 2006 the postal delivery service will be opened up to competition so we should see alternative post boxes springing up. Should be interesting to see what happens from then in. We had a leaflet that said all first class deliveries would be delivered by midday,but it did not say which midday LOL

Do the temps get paid hourly? Just thinking that if they are then sitting at home for a few hours and doing the round later in the day could have benifits for them? Call me a cynic! ;)

Don't know about what time it comes at the minute but is always here before 3.30, am told about 11 this morning. While i was off during the summer it was usually about 10.30, and the same person everyday, though not the normal guy but he could have left/changed rounds. We are in Crookes.

Our post in Stannington varies, but most of the time it comes about 11 AM, well usually between 11 and 12.

Not that it matters, it's nearly always all junk mail or me Mum's book club anyway.

Originally posted by robbie
Is it just our street or are they going down the tubes?

We got our post at 17.05 yesterday.

we had the post of 2 houses down stuck through our front door as they have no front letterbox (every house uses the back doors round here)

Its consistantly after 13.30 and you get your stuff a day after you should do.

One big joke...

We've had mail at 5:20 pm - half of it junk mail.

It has gone down the pan but they must have lost a lot of business with the e-revolution.

It's a damn disgrace.And - I suspect -a deliberate downgrading of service so that the public will want more competition and private operators.
One of the bosses came from that knocking shop at the Football HQ.So a fat lot he knows about delivering a vital public service.
You will have noticed that they have now removed the metal tags from the post boxes which let you know the next collection.The whole thing is an utter shambles and the Government should sack them now before they do any more damage.
In the past month I have suffered the late delivery of flight tickets
and the loss of a package posted to Scotland three weeks ago.

Originally posted by BAZZO
It's a damn disgrace.And - I suspect -a deliberate downgrading of service so that the public will want more competition and private operators.


Do you think the service is likely to improve when this happens though?

It is quite obvious that there is widespread dissatisfaction with the postal service as a whole. Until a few months ago I was served by a young postman who you could set your watch by. He has now disappeared and been replaced by a motley crew who arrive at various times during the day. They wonder around hopelessly confused and are frequently delivering mail to wrong addresses.

I am currently awaiting some CDs and I am beginning to wonder if someone on another street is enjoying these instead of myself. :mad:

Well, a postie somewhere did a good job when I sent a CD up to our relative in S6, however I sent it to the wrong house number:rolleyes:, right road (and right postcode) the full postcode not just S6. However, it went to the wrong house number of their road and four weeks round it managed to get back to them 3 doors down in safe hands CD intact and looked as if it hadn't been played.

Alex

Well they managed to get to our street before 7:00pm today, nice and early (for these days) at around 2:00.

Although they still somehow managed to put all of our post, next door's post, next door but one's post, and the house next to that's post through our letterbox...

Anyone had mail opened / stolen recently?

On my birthday, one card arrived opened (with a cheque in it) and two that contained cash never arrived.

This has happened before to me and people I know. I complained but I doubt anything will be done about it... its really annoying cos theres no alternative if you don't trust Royal Mail to deliver. We're stuck with them.. good or bad.

I got married earlier this year and there were a few cards containing gift vouchers that never made it to us.

My wife's PIN number letter for her new credit card was opened, and the flap concealing the number peeled back, though the scratch panel was intact. However we still got the card issuer to cancel the pin and send her a new one.

I send a lot through the post, spending between £50 - £100 at the post office in a week.

I rarely have problems with people receiving parcels, even those that are sent non-recorded - and my post is always delivered in good time to me (OK, so anything between 9am and 6pm is good for me, as I'm out all day anyway)

Originally posted by amhudson119
Well, a postie somewhere did a good job when I sent a CD up to our relative in S6, however I sent it to the wrong house number:rolleyes: ... it went to the wrong house number of their road

I'm not clear - are you complaining that they delivered the CD to the place it was addressed to?:confused:

Problem seems to be everywhere - I live where we can get BBC local radio from Birmingham and it's the same in the West Midlands. Radio WM have been taking calls about latest postal deliveries in the day - winner at the moment is a woman in Brum who had a deilvery at 7.15 in the evening. Anyone in Sheffield that can beat that?

Maybe we expect too much for our 28 pence ?

My housemate was in Somerfield's on Ecclesall Road last night, and apparently overheard what seemed like two posties having a conversation. One was bragging about how a fellow worker had got £90.00 the previous day from birthday cards.

If this is true or not, best be safe and send by Recorded Delivery, or don't put cash in the post at all.

Had a card left yesterday asking me to collect a package from the sorting office as it wouldn't fit through my letter box.

But instead of the usual "wait 24 hours before collecting", it now has (pre-printed on the card) "wait 48 hours before collecting."

Netherthorpe to Pond Street takes 48 hours?

I also remember that before the collection office moved across Pond St to the swanky new building, it used to be open until around 7pm in the evening. But now, it closes at 12.30pm, meaning a dash down at lunchtime or early morning detour. No doubt there's some weaselly "to increase customer service" reason for this!

Coupled with the fact that I've never seen my postman's face in any other expression than totally miserable..... I'm not terribly impressed with the Post Office/Royal Mail at the moment.

There is all sorts of dodgyness in the PO.

I had a new chip and PIN card intercepted by a PO worker in Birmingham. They then went on to spend over £1,100 of my money at 14 seperate Sainsburys.

Apparently, this is quite common. Natwest had set up a special anti-fraud department for intercepted cards.

Worrying!

M

Originally posted by gladdenj
My housemate was in Somerfield's on Ecclesall Road last night, and apparently overheard what seemed like two posties having a conversation. One was bragging about how a fellow worker had got £90.00 the previous day from birthday cards.

If this is true or not, best be safe and send by Recorded Delivery, or don't put cash in the post at all.

Sending it recorded won't make any difference - all that means is it has to be signed for when it's delivered. Other than that it's just standard first class post, so no guarantees as to when (or whether) it'll be delivered. Even using special delivery it's still a postie who takes it to your door, and they could happily steal it (though you would be entitled to claim the value back from the PO).

Don't send cash in the post. A crossed cheque payable to the right person is much safer.

I've also known recorded delivery take up to 15 days to reach it's destination.

my 2 eminem tickets got lost in the post. they were sent recorded delivery. and they didnt arrive. and because tickets are
'cash like items' all we got from royal mail was a book of 1st class stamps. thanks rm

I had to go and sign for a recorded delivery this week which arrived when no one was in. It took them three days to get it back to the sorting office!

I'd like to say thanks to the chap in the sorting office who kept a look out for it, though and phoned me to say it was in.

You're lucky to be able to get through to your sorting office. What is the point of leaving a telephone number on the 'unable to deliver' cards when they don't answer the phone?

2 items (letter and dvd rental) were opened an put through my front letterbox today. I hope they just got put through wrong door and opened in error. Howver I'm sure I'm overdue dvd's:rolleyes:

Post came at 8.30 this morning (sat).

My question is to do with collection rather than delivery.

If a post box has no white notice on the front and no little plate in the slot above the hole, it it in use or not.

I know where there are several like this and I never know whether to use them or not?

Anybody posting cash deserves to lose it. RoyalMail encourage you to not post cash. Your letter is passed through a mechanised process. Depending on where you post to and from, it could pass through 8 machines. All i Can say is if your posting something small and valuable, make sure the letter is over 6mm thick. It will be kicked out at the first stage of processing.

can't comment on the late deleveries. I'm not a postman.

Originally posted by jason_b
Anybody posting cash deserves to lose it.

...I'm sorry, but I TOTALLY disagree with that comment. People putting money in cards (may due to evidence be unwise!) but certainly do not deserve to be robbed.

That's like saying that people in the street deserve to be mugged!

There was the programme on channel 4 (or 5?) recently which uncovered this sort of robbery at sorting offices - pressure needs to be continually put on the PO to find, and make examples of these employees, and stamp it out.
I don't think these people steal because they are poorly paid - they steal because they are criminally inclined!....and the PO offers great opportunities for theft because people still basically trust that their service is honest (as it probably still is overall).

Sad to hear that the RM is slowly going down the tubes but they only have themselves to blame.
I used to work in the sorting offices at Pond St and Brightside. The attitude of the Managers to the staff was totally disgusting to the point of staff taking their complaints to the unions and causing walkouts, stopping the job completely.
It was always said that the company was on the slide and even 4 years after leaving, I still see many ex-colleagues, sorters and postmen/women who were fed up with the costcutting attitude, they left.
The bringing in of cheap labour, not trained, no knowledge of the city, unable to read, well the results are easy to see.
Sky have deciced to use TNT to deliver thier mail and the market is due to open up to all-comers. RM had a good thing going and to the suggestion that they should scrap 2nd class post, I remember that this was suggested to them years ago, but as usual, all good ideas get rejected unless it comes from certain people high up in the company.
Even so I did have good times whilst working there and its a shame to see the demise of what was a worldleader and worldbeater in distribution locally and nationally.
oh yeah my post gets to me now at 1pm as opposed to 10.30am so I guess at the moment, its acceptable.
bassplayer

I work for parcel force as a delivery driver and as it is part of Royal Mail i have been on training days with postmen/women and i have to say that the training they give you is very good,brightside lane sorting office was full of hard working people from what i could tell.
I know some people have a go at drivers for delivering late or to the wrong address but we really do try our best with the sometimes very limited address details we have. We are on very tight schedules and i have to say that its rare that we make mistakes,which is why parcel force is the best.

just a quick reply to the post 2 up from this.

TNT customers are actually taking their business back to royal mail,it may no longer have the monopoly but it is still the leader in the market.

As far as bad management is concerned,all i saw at brightside lane was very helpful managers.So nice infact that i would feel better talking to them about any job issues than going to my own line manager!