Taking in parcels for neighbours

I will take parcels in for anyone, including next door’s medication because the pharmacy delivery driver hasn’t time to wait while she gets to the door. She’s wrong side of 95 and if she doesn’t hear the bell I pop a message through the door to ring me when she’s ready to open the door. When I take a parcel round to a neighbour I take a message for them too asking them to collect in case they are not at home. If it’s too heavy for me I knock and ask them to come and get it. I have volunteered to take in parcels a few doors down too rather than have them potentially lose their parcel. Our lovely local Hermes driver knows I am safe to leave parcels with so asks occasionally for people I don’t know. Most people who get a note from the delivery driver collect from me when they get home. Exercise is always good for us if we are able. If I am having a bad day and can’t, I wait for a good day. Smiles are good for us too.

In Lockdown a lovely neighbour from 10 doors up whom I hadn’t met before took my mail to the post office. Another offered to shop for me. I thought this sort of thing was what neighbours do. And I live in London where we are told that people are unfriendly!

People are funny though. Years ago I had a parcel delivered to a neighbour nearby and the delivery driver later told me that the neighbour had shouted at him not to do it again quite aggressively. But when I went round for it he was nice as pie. There’s no accounting for folks.

MerylStreep

ElderlyPerson
i was told such a thing is unlikely
How about this scenario.
Delivery driver wearing an Amazon tea shirt approaches house with parcel.
Door opens and driver pushes his way in and attacks woman.
2nd woman comes to help she too is attacked.
3rd woman comes downstairs and too is attacked.
Driver rushes into lounge and grabs what looks like a hard drive.
Driver leaves property.
Owner of property is alerted of attack. Because house had cctv everywhere there was a very clear picture of the attacker.
Owner of property quickly puts this cctv image of the attack on FB.
Attacker sees this and flees with his wife ( very quickly) to Romania.
I would like to know your honest opinion of this bizarre scenario.

Wearing clothing so as to give a false impression of being there for a particular purpose is not unknown.

If it had just been an unknown man then she might not have opened the door and may well have exercised caution, but she was lulled into a false sense of security and taken by surprise.

Men are on average stronger than women. Certainly there are strong women who do boxing and the like, and frail men, but a tough man using deception may well be much stronger against three women, some of whom may be elderly.

It could be that the wife of an industrialist lives there with her widowed DM and widowed DMiL and that her husband, who works from home has been seen popping out to the shops, taking a break from his work on designing the new supercomputer integrated circuits.

I would think that the first action of the owner of the property, who has returned from the shops is to call ambulance assistance and ask ambulance control to call the police, while doing his best to help the three women.

Clearly the attacker has fled with the stolen item and may well want to try to minimise the chance of being caught.

We always go and collect ours offering a thank you in person.

You seem to be a useful resource to your neighbours. This is something you can give freely, with minimal effort or inconvenience. BE NICE!

Call them and tell them (not ask them) to come for it. They might not know it has already arrived.

MerylStreep

ElderlyPerson
i was told such a thing is unlikely
How about this scenario.
Delivery driver wearing an Amazon tea shirt approaches house with parcel.
Door opens and driver pushes his way in and attacks woman.
2nd woman comes to help she too is attacked.
3rd woman comes downstairs and too is attacked.
Driver rushes into lounge and grabs what looks like a hard drive.
Driver leaves property.
Owner of property is alerted of attack. Because house had cctv everywhere there was a very clear picture of the attacker.
Owner of property quickly puts this cctv image of the attack on FB.
Attacker sees this and flees with his wife ( very quickly) to Romania.
I would like to know your honest opinion of this bizarre scenario.

Yes, I saw that programme a few evenings ago too! Scary.

Where I used to live the nasty elderly woman next door ( she didn’t like me, as I told her daughter in law off for scratching my sons car while she was trying to get in a gap far too small) took in a bouquet of flowers from my daughter for my birthday, delivered by mistake to her by the delivery driver.
I didn’t know she had them, and she never passed them on directly, but gave them to another neighbour when she saw him to give me. A really nasty person and glad I now live in a lovely close with lovely friendly neighbours.

Petera
ElderlyPerson is a bona fide poster who has been posting for some time.

ElderlyPerson

dianne2265

Sorry that was aimed at elderlyperson

What exactly was rude please?

Just because I have a different view from most of the people who have posted in this thread does not make me rude.

You have been rude several times in this thread, for example instructing people to "think about it" as if that's not exactly what they are doing.

Think about it.

OP I would text the neighbour telling them that the parcel is at your house and could they possibly come and collect it today, as it is in your way?

That way you are sure they know where it is and if they don't come, phone and ask when they will be coming for it, as you want to be sure to be in when they come.

When you see or speak to them, say you don't mind taking in parcels, but you really don't want them cluttering up your hall for ages.

Unless of course you prefer just to ask them not to have parcels delivered to your place.

ElderlyPerson
i was told such a thing is unlikely
How about this scenario.
Delivery driver wearing an Amazon tea shirt approaches house with parcel.
Door opens and driver pushes his way in and attacks woman.
2nd woman comes to help she too is attacked.
3rd woman comes downstairs and too is attacked.
Driver rushes into lounge and grabs what looks like a hard drive.
Driver leaves property.
Owner of property is alerted of attack. Because house had cctv everywhere there was a very clear picture of the attacker.
Owner of property quickly puts this cctv image of the attack on FB.
Attacker sees this and flees with his wife ( very quickly) to Romania.
I would like to know your honest opinion of this bizarre scenario.

dianne2265

Sorry that was aimed at elderlyperson

What exactly was rude please?

Just because I have a different view from most of the people who have posted in this thread does not make me rude.

early
I even have an arrangement with the woman who lives in the parallel lane, same house number. We often get misdeliveries for one another. I live in the Lane. She lives in the Drive. It happens. We’ve become friends as, thorough misdeliveries, we got to know which magazines we each subscibe to. We have similar tastes so now we exchange them with one another once read. She gets my Country Walking. I get her National Geographic. Win, win.

Oh that’s a lovely story …

I have found DPD very good.

Since the pandemic they have a choice of two ways.

One is for them to place parcel on the doorstep then knock then stand back, recipient to open the door ajar then while still inside stand back. DPD driver takes photograph of parcel by ajar door and goes.

The other is for recipient to put signed note on the door authorising leaving on doorstep or "safe place" and not opening the door. Driver puts parcel on doorstep or in safe place, photographs parcel and signed note and then goes.

I use the second one. In practice I also add a request to knock the door as he leaves, and he does that.

One day, a knock at the door, I answered from the upstairs window, and the DPD driver with a parcel that I had ordered but the sender had not sent me an email so I had not put out a note and I was not expecting the parcel so soon anyway.

Driver asked "Shall I leave it on the doorstep?". I said "Yes please" and also thanked him as he went.

www.dpd.co.uk/content/how-can-we-help/parcel-delivery-during-covid-19.jsp

‘Missed you’ cards are now on line with some couriers. This is ok if you are expecting a parcel, but if it is a surprise you don’t know you need to look on line. Had a few arguments about this.

SueDonim

^Alright, a scenario. She lives alone. She ordered some underwear mailorder. The delivery driver has left it with the man in the house opposite. She knows that his wife fled to a refuge. The delivery driver has given him an excuse to interact with her. She is worried. What does she do? Would she ever wear that underwear as she knows it has been in his house with him? She looks from her window at his house and knows her parcel is in there.^

What a creepy thing to write.

I think we are being spammed by a teenager who's trying to see how far they can go.

I just had 2 massive parcels delivered at the door but they were at the wrong house and street, luckily I caught him at the gate and he took them away. I used to take in parcels for my next door neighbours, but even though they're courteous they've never done it for me so I stopped. The same with the bins, I've always taken the next door neighbours in when collecting mine as they're outside my fence, the main reason for doing so is so they don't blow down the street on windy days and in front of cars etc ... but if they are first to go out for them they will only get their own. I leave theirs now and they will drive past it several times a day and just leave it there sometimes for a whole week!

they dont collect because they don't know it is with you' no card left

Like other GNs here, we're happy to help our neighbours with parcels & they do the same for us. I'll always call round for a parcel - if we know it's been delivered somewhere! But I'll happily take a parcel round to a neighbour, if I can. I think it depends on where you live; we're in a quiet residential area, with helpful neighbours.

Sorry that was aimed at elderlyperson

We've been caught a few times.
One neighbour rarely collects "oh I didn't come in case you were eating" - sure I'm fat but actually only eat the usual 3 meals a day, not trough thenwhole day. She prefers the other neighbour to have her stuff anyway so I send any one there!!

The other side are great at collecting but it's a standing joke with them that the minute I see them loading their car for a few days away I know they will get a parcel!!

If you pay for delivery then unless you have specified a safe place or neighbour then it should be delivered to your door. This is what Hermes state they do but some of their couriers don’t.

Usually most carriers text or email to tell you when your parcel will be delivered within an hour. If you aren’t in, a card should be put through the door telling you they will try again the next day or do you have a neighbour. Nowadays they don’t usually go direct to a neighbour without your permission. This has arisen during the pandemic. They don’t even need a signature if they take a photo. So much quicker than faffing around looking for a neighbour. Problems arise when it’s not your door.

How rude. If you are ever in need I think you will find with your attitude people with be unlikely to help you no matter what the problem. I certainly wouldn't.

We are more than happy to take parcels in for our neighbours, and they for us, and we will take said parcels to them once we know they're home again, and of course collect ours promptly.

As I shop almost totally online now I get a lot of deliveries. I don't want to inconvenience our neighbours too often, so we have a large parcel box by our front door. Although we're not often out if I'm just in the garden I can't hear the door bell/delivery man. Our postman and the local couriers are quite happy to leave parcels in the box, with the exception of DPD who refuse because the box isn't lockable. It's not visible from the street and it's a very quiet village.

Occasionally cards are not left telling us (or our neighbours) that a parcel has been left elsewhere, so we don't know to go and collect it. Also there are two other houses with the same number within 50 yards of us which can cause confusion. Before the pandemic our local Post Office accepted parcels from any delivery service for people to pick them up, but now they don't do it anymore and the P.O. only opens 3 days a week.

For us the most annoying thing about deliveries is when parcels are thrown over the side gate rather than leave them in the parcel box (DPD again!) and things get broken. When I complained I was told the delivery person had opened the gate to put the parcel in a safe place. Because of the way the gate locks he could not have opened it so had to have thrown it over.

SueDonim

^Alright, a scenario. She lives alone. She ordered some underwear mailorder. The delivery driver has left it with the man in the house opposite. She knows that his wife fled to a refuge. The delivery driver has given him an excuse to interact with her. She is worried. What does she do? Would she ever wear that underwear as she knows it has been in his house with him? She looks from her window at his house and knows her parcel is in there.^

What a creepy thing to write.

I was told such a thing was unlikely.

So, as I had been to creative writing class, and writing promptly generating a scenario given some basic concept was part of what we did, I responded to the challenge.

It is exploring human nature.