Royal mail parcel delivery

I am surprised they didn’t leave it on the doorstep. I can get to my front door quite quickly but they are often back in the car by the time I get there. Everyone is in such a hurry these days.

Our postman told me he has four minutes to deliver a parcel!

Perhaps he had previously worked for a car parking company. You get one minute to answer the door, then he is off.

Worse is when they leave the parcel on the doorstep without ringing the bell!
Postmen don't do this but other delivery companies do.

I sympathize, as this has happened a lot in the past. There's an online RM form you can fill in requesting, amongst other things, for the postman to give you extra time to get to the door. Since I filled it in, that's what's happened.

From what I remember, when you get an email from RM telling you you weren't in (even though you were) there's a section on that that asks you for your special requests (ie: where they can leave a parcel, etc).

Hope this helps (even if I've not explained it very well

We are expecting a parcel today. On the Track and Divert section, there are multiple choices that you can choose to have your parcel left.
There is nowhere that you can say, " I will be in, give it only to me. Then you can take a picture of me and said parcel.

If Royal Mail have 4 minutes to deliver, presumably that includes taking a photo?
I am so fed up with these delivery firms who tout for the business, then fail to deliver what they promised.
We have a working doorbell and door knocker.
Do they try them, no!

We’re very lucky with our postman. He always waits while I (frequently) have to fetch keys for the double-locked front door. If there’s a Royal Mail option when I’m ordering online I always use it, even if I costs a little bit more.

Plus I use Click and Drop a lot for parcels I send to Knit for Nowt - only in my case it’s Click and the Postman Collects.

Marydoll

Our postman told me he has four minutes to deliver a parcel!

Would that be 4 minutes from leaving the depot or 4 minutes from parking the van, walking up the path to the door etc.........the latter does sound more realistic though. Royal Mail do seen pretty good here just now but EVRI are dreadful! One delivery driver claimed to have put my parcel in the shed.......there isn't a shed accessible from the front of the property and no way to get to the back apart from through the house! In reality, they had propped the parcel up on the window ledge by the side of the door - in full view of anyone walking past the house!

Our postman is good, but other delivery services (including Parcel Force) are much less so. Like others, we have a doorbell, but they never use it. Some bang on the door as though it's a police raid, then scoot off down the path like the hounds of Hell are chasing them. By the time I get to the door they have usually driven off and left the parcel on the doorstep, not knowing whether we were in or out. I've had items left for days as they arrived long before we were advised when ordering. Others have arrived late and we've gone away, so again they were left unattended and in view of passers by, despite the fact that I always ask for them to be left at the back of the house.

Considering the cost of postage these days, the least they could do is make sure that parcels are actually handed to someone, and not left unattended unless the courier is given express consent to do so (and then they should leave it where instructed).

Both our postman and Evri people are brilliant. I have no problem with them at all.

You are very lucky to get it at all considering Royal Mail were recently fined £10m+ for late and undelivered post and parcels.

Marydoll

Both our postman and Evri people are brilliant. I have no problem with them at all.

My experience is exactly the same. Our Evri lady is particulalry mice, always smiley and cheerful.

If I am expecting a parcel, Royal Mail, DPD and Evri always email and text to give a delivery time window. I stick a note to the front door saying, “I’m in. Please wait for me to open the door.” Else, if I’m going to be out, I stick a plastic lidded box by the door (behind a shrub) with a note to say put the parcel inside. Or I email to advise them of a safe place to leave something more valuable out of sight or ask them to leave it with a neighbour aftering checking that they will be in and are happy to take delivery for me.

It really doesn’t make much forethought to help out busy drivers on tight schedules.

I had a delivery from DPD yesterday, scheduled between 14:30 and 15:30. At 14:12 I saw the driver pull up and opened the door before he could knock. He told me he is not allowed to be more than 15 minutes ahead of schedule so I joked that we had three minutes to stand and have a chat. He replied that his vehicle is being tracked so his employers would know he had arrived. I said I would pretend to have been slow getting to the door so he could take his photo of the parcel on my doormat at 14:15.

Our EVRI delivery guy is absolutely excellent. We have a gem. The GPO is fine sometimes and on others it’s not.

I won’t have a door bell as kids tend to ring it then run away. If we are expecting a delivery I leave a huge note on the door to say knock loudly and wait. My DH has very poor hearing and mobility so it takes him a while to get to the door.

Our Evri chap is good, too. It’s the companies who use a different courier every time who are the worst.

How is one supposed to have foresight when delivery dates are so erratic, SilverBrook? I have no objection to helping out drivers, but I am busy, and can’t run my life around their schedules - particularly as I don’t know what they are. Getting an email to say something is on its way is no use if I am working or otherwise not at home. I can’t just nip back on the offchance that it will be delivered according to the time on the message either. Usually there is a three hour window.

This happened to me with a pre-christmas present I ordered.

When the delivery was finally re-arranged it was the same man because I had received a photo ID of him. I just told him to knock louder in future as I has been in before!

Not Royal Mail though.

We ordered a new laptop from Amazon. The driver left it on the doorstep without ringing the bell. An expensive item to leave to chance.

Still trying to get Royal Mail to send a parcel back to a seller! Been two weeks & they say I should go & pick the parcel up myself! Being disabled & almost housebound now it is impossible but they do not seem to care! We have if lucky two deliveries of post per week never on a Saturday as they now say they are cutting. Second class post also being cut back so maybe we will get one delivery a week & no parcels left as I cannot get to the door in time before they leave! Obviously customers do not count anymore!

It really annoying when you miss the deliveryman . But to be fair to them they have to work to a deadline. And I've been at peoples houses when the door is knocked ( im not saying it applies to you honestly) but they can dry their hands , shoo the dog away , look for keys, keeping muttering "i wonder who this is ?" And eventually say "oh theyve gone !" Not sure how long the deliveryman should allow before discovering nobody home.? But it IS very annoying for both parties .

Our postman is always running.

The problem for Royal Mail is that other courier services have annexed the lucrative parcels section to mainland UK ,and have left RM holding the unprofitable baby.
DPD etc will be happy to deliver your Amazon parcels, but have absolutely no interest in delivering your birthday card to your aunt in Tobermory.

Our postie is brilliant, no problems with RM here, but I know it's going to depend on where people live.

Very rarely order online so haven't had enough deliveries to know about other services recently.

blue14

Worse is when they leave the parcel on the doorstep without ringing the bell!
Postmen don't do this but other delivery companies do.

Royal Mail sent my husband a text today to say they'd delivered his parcel ok - nobody had knocked at our door (we were both in the living room), no parcel left outside. They sent him a photo of the parcel - on the doorstep of no. 17 (we are at 43). DH went round there to retrieve it, to find that the door is not like the one in the 'photo. So number 17 where? The parcel contains my husband's medications for a month, from Pharmacy2U.

Just for balance, our postman never leaves a parcel unattended on the step because he knows to leave it in the greenhouse if we're out. We exchange Christmas cards with him and always leave him a little gift on Christmas Eve. Other delivery drivers are usually polite and will leave a parcel with a neighbour - and leave theirs with us if they aren't in. Maybe I'm just lucky enough to live in a civilised part of the country!