Postal Delays

[Tricky-CRS]

as an example:

I bought stuff from Hotel Choc on Sunday 6th December on 48hr delivery. 

It was ready for Parcel Force to collect Monday Morning of the 7th

Parcel Force Collected it On Friday 11th

It got to Home County Depot on Saturday 12th

It Arrived in Manchester Depot on Wednesday 16th

And should be delivered today before 21:00

So near 2 weeks to do 48hr delivery 2nd class will take some time, Amazon, DPD & Hermes seem to be faring alot better.

[cessna152towser]

18 hours ago, hayfield said:

One would have thought the some/all of the postal collections would have been diverted elsewhere to elevate the problems

I'm not sure I'd want to elevate the problems - alleviate them perhaps?

[hayfield]

1 hour ago, hayfield said:

 

I am a great supporter of the Royal Mail, using its 1st class service or Airmail almost exclusively. Posted an item Monday, had feedback yesterday. Receiving not as good, item posted Saturday expected today a second item was posted on Monday eBay expects delivery Saturday/Monday. Slightly disappointed rather than annoyed

 

I see from BBC news Royal Mail now deliver more packets than letters, and as per photo are dealing with record numbers of items, in one way this is great news for the Royal Mail as it must make them more financially viable, but gone are the days where the posty leaves the sorting office with a sack of letters, plus they pick up as well now. I assume there is a new way of working and that for once the unions see this as an opportunity for their members rather than drag their feet, which again is good news

 

A quick update, the packet arrived today (Thursday) as indicated, sent 2nd class recorded, for 27p extra it could have gone 1st class and as I paid £3.45 as a seller I would have sent it 1st

 

Note to myself to put my prices up as I was happy to pat £3.45 for a small packet, as it happens it was under £20 in value I would have sent it normally with proof of purchase

[caradoc]

Maybe it's time the Royal Mail considered some new ways of working. For example, they could have a nationwide network of dedicated rail services with mail sorted on the train to save time. They could consider a system allowing mail to be dropped off or picked up, without the train having to stop ! And they could even have their own underground railway linking the various depots in London. 

 

[hayfield]

I used to finish work at 1am, often I would pass a large Royal Mail HGV heading northwards, I think they have a good distributing system already

 

I remember looking at the tracking of one company, the package was being sent from a few miles away in Essex it was collected to a local hub near to the sender, sent to the national distribution centre in the Midlands then many miles back to my local hub, which happened to be quite close to the original hub then out to me. Rather than traveling 10-15 miles it went more than 150 miles

[Legend]

I think we have to be a little patient .

 

They are grappling both with Covid (and infection rates are rising) and the increased volumes as a result of us shopping on line .

 

Imagine someone in a sorting office tests positive . Track and trace (if they get in touch) but certainly management will want to know who of your co workers you have been in touch with . Before you know it a whole tranche of employees have to self isolate . Ok you can bring some new ones in , but it all takes time .  

 

Safety must always come first

[Bucoops]

We seem to have two deliveries a day - one for letters and one for packets. Sometimes they arrive at the same time, sometimes we get neither, sometimes one will be in the morning and one in the afternoon.

 

I always give a cheery thank you - whatever the faults are at the moment, it's certainly not with the last mile people.

 

Talking of strange tracking, DHL are a good one. We are roughly the same distance from Heathrow as we are to Gatwick. Sometimes we have packets that go to Gatwick, then Heathrow then delivered. Sometimes the other way round. I'm sure there's logic in there somewhere...

[Stephen Freeman]

The whole system whoever they are seems to be in a mess. I have decided not to try and buy or sell anything else (I have done quite enough of that today anyway) until the madness ceases. After all it doesn't help when the Courier doesn't actually both to call and collect the parcel!

 

Still waiting for parcel from London area from nearly a week ago (Royal Mail this time).

[Platform 1]

5 hours ago, caradoc said:

system allowing mail to be dropped off or picked up, without the train having to stop

Not sure I'd want delicate parts flung around at 90mph! 

[Oldddudders]

8 minutes ago, Platform 1 said:

Not sure I'd want delicate parts flung around at 90mph! 

I have travelled at considerably more than 90 mph by car, train and air, and my delicate parts are still more or less in working order. 

[Mike Bellamy]

1 hour ago, Bucoops said:

 

Talking of strange tracking, DHL are a good one. We are roughly the same distance from Heathrow as we are to Gatwick. Sometimes we have packets that go to Gatwick, then Heathrow then delivered. Sometimes the other way round. I'm sure there's logic in there somewhere...

 

 

I had to send a parcel from work to Israel - when it was delayed, I checked the route Heathrow - Johannesburg - Cape Town - Heathrow - Tel Aviv . . . . . on another occasion in Israel again, the delivery van was hijacked and valuables stolen - it took ages to work out what papers had been sent and to reprint them all (mostly students' exam results).

[Platform 1]

In case it helps, RM have a Service Update web page that may throw light on delays in the system:

https://personal.help.royalmail.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/12556

 

Given the comments in this thread and at my local PO counter, their status wording is rather optimistic!

[Crosland]

11 hours ago, hayfield said:

I see from BBC news Royal Mail now deliver more packets than letters, and as per photo are dealing with record numbers of items, in one way this is great news for the Royal Mail as it must make them more financially viable, 

 

The problem is (same article, or at least the version I read last week) that parcels are still sorted manually. There is no automated handling system, with miles of conveyors and scanners, like you see in a DHL depot, for example. 

[Sir TophamHatt]

21 hours ago, Railpassion said:

I was at the PO this afternoon where they advised me to post immediately as First Class was being delayed by up to a week! They said 2nd would stand no chance of delivery before Xmas. 

I wonder if that's regional though.

If I'm sending second class to someone in the same county, I'd expect it to get there before Christmas.

 

Bought something less than 5 days ago from ebay, that arrived today, 2nd class.

[BokStein]

1 hour ago, Sir TophamHatt said:

I wonder if that's regional though.

If I'm sending second class to someone in the same county, I'd expect it to get there before Christmas.

 

Bought something less than 5 days ago from ebay, that arrived today, 2nd class.

 

Probably not!

 

As I understand it locally, post within the BN postcode is taken to Gatwick for sorting then back to, say, Arundel for delivery!

Edited December 17, 2020 by BokStein

[Butler Henderson]

First class small parcel sent from North Yorkshire on Monday arrived at its destination in Nottingham on Wednesday. 

[John M Upton]

23 minutes ago, BokStein said:

 

Probably not!

 

As I understand it locally, post within the BN postcode is taken to Gatwick for sorting then back to, say, Arundel for delivery!

 

I can relate to that.  Card from myself to my parents, distance just three miles BUT I am in the PO22 area, they are in BN18 so instead it goes down to Bognor, across to Portsmouth, up to Redhill/Gatwick, down to Brighton and then along to Arundel.

 

And they say they are supposed to be cutting down carbon footprints.....

Edited December 17, 2020 by John M Upton

[meatloaf]

I work for post office.

 

Over the past month we have seen an increase of mail probably 10x what it normally would be at this time of year. We have 4 collections a day and sometimes the last collection isnt all taken as due to lack of room in the van.

 

Special deliveries are sometimes taking 2 days to arrive. We have been told that anything posted 2nd class will not arrive in time for christmas and even first class isnt guaranteed to arrive and thats despite the last offical posting date has not yet passed.

 

Our postman is telling us that In the stoke / wolverhampton area they have recruited over 30,000 temp staff, but they are still massivly struggling due to staff being off sick and isolationg becasue of covid. Added to the fact that the postmen are only operating the vans single manned whereas before they were dual manned. They have been told they can share a van - but only if they have all the windows open. Maybe a solution for summer but not winter id have thought.

 

On a typical day at work on the counter i must get at least a dozen people asking where there parcels are. Its frustrating for me to have to try and explain the delays as some customers do blame the post office - after all its us they have given the parcel to.

 

Some areas are now delivering sundays as well but i dont think its going to be enough

[Enterprisingwestern]

18 hours ago, caradoc said:

Maybe it's time the Royal Mail considered some new ways of working. For example, they could have a nationwide network of dedicated rail services with mail sorted on the train to save time. They could consider a system allowing mail to be dropped off or picked up, without the train having to stop ! And they could even have their own underground railway linking the various depots in London. 

 

 

Where did you get that stupid hare brained idea from, it will never work!!

 

Mike.

[JohnR]

On 16/12/2020 at 14:15, JohnR said:

I think the Sheffield sorting centre has been overwhelmed. I've had a parcel from Rails stuck there since last Thursday. 

 

I dont mind, I would just like a guarantee it will get here before Christmas! 

 

And the good news is that it finally moved overnight and is out for delivery today!

 

I know we should be patient, but it can be stressful.

 

[fezza]

What annoys me is that Covid has now become the default excuse for any crap service whether or not its justified. It is the modern equivalent of "don't you know there's a war on?" 

 

It's not like this is the first time we've had Christmas or RM didn't know what month Christmas would be this year... 

[Legend]

14 minutes ago, fezza said:

What annoys me is that Covid has now become the default excuse for any crap service whether or not its justified. It is the modern equivalent of "don't you know there's a war on?" 

 

It's not like this is the first time we've had Christmas or RM didn't know what month Christmas would be this year... 

 It might be getting used as an excuse but I can assure you it’s real . I don’t work in Post Office but I am sitting in on calls from manufacturing sites and I can tell you managing people in the Covid crisis is challenging .the key is of course to make sure people are safe , you really wouldn’t want someone exposed to this disease to deliver your model train.  My colleagues are doing an outstanding job keeping lines running , but it isn’t easy .  Imagine half a sorting office having to self isolate at very short notice , you think you can just get folk in? 
 

To be honest they are under strain now , but I think the Post Office have done a great job through this pandemic . They need a bit of support and patience now . 

[newbryford]

 

 

 

 

[hayfield]

2 hours ago, Enterprisingwestern said:

 

Where did you get that stupid hare brained idea from, it will never work!!

 

Mike.

 

I took it as tongue in cheek, having said this is there not a very large Royal Mail rail centre in Willesden ?

[fezza]

I'm not knocking people who are working hard but I don't have much sympathy for RM who knew Covid would disrupt Christmas deliveries months ago but have failed to recruit and train enough people to deal with it. I know several people in the pub and catering trade who have tried to get seasonal RM work but have  been rejected. One got taken on straight away by DPD. Guess which firm isn't struggling to fulfil delivery schedules?