A Cautionary Tale

[great central]

A couple of weeks ago I agreed to buy a few items from someone disposing of their collection. A price was agreed and paid by bank transfer. Everything is going OK up to now. The seller emailed to tell me the parcel had been dispatched to the address I gave.

I decided, perhaps foolishly in hindsight, to have it sent to my holiday home as I would be there for about 10 days. Anyway, the parcel doesn't arrive, checking with the site office daily until late last week when I went to the local library to use their internet and send the seller a message. He informed me, and sent a screen grab of the tracking information, that the parcel was down for delivery on Monday 21st, taken from the depot by the courier at 09.47. At around 14.00 the parcel was marked as not delivered due to post code error. After that nothing.

I tried phoning the parcel company, whose call centre were not very helpful, just saying that as the item had not been 'scanned' for over 5 days it was classed as lost and to make a claim. I also found their 'local' depot around 70 miles away and got a rather more sympathetic voice on the phone who tried to contact the courier without success.

When I re-read my original email giving the address to send it to, I realised there was a mistake, I had obviously hit the wrong key, 2 instead of 5, and despite checking must have 'read what I expected to read'

The 'wrong' address was about 3 miles away just off the seafront among a load of hotels and holiday flats, certainly not a caravan site!

The parcel was being carried by one company but had been sent by another, the carrying company said it wasn't their problem and to contact the other one, which I did and their call centre said they'd get back to me in 24 hours, that was Monday this week.

The seller has sent several emails to them about this, the carrying company being unsympathetic and unhelpful despite the fact it was in their possession when it was 'lost'  

My rather cynical side says that if there is something like this which makes a parcel undeliverable, a less than honest person would hold on, see if there are any queries raised, which judging by the call cente's attitude there may not be, and then after a suitable time Ebay beckons, Grrrr!

 

STOP PRESS! I've  just had an email while typing this, my parcel has been found and should be delivered tomorrow, I'm back at home now, but I've asked the site office to put my parcel in my caravan and someone will bring it home for me, various family members are using it over the next few weeks.

 

Anyway, to everyone sending address information to a seller, which many of of us do regularly, please check, re-check, go have a cuppa and check again that you've typed the address correctly especially the postcode!

[wirey33]

Write an email which contains your full address

 

Don't send it, but keep it in your "Drafts" folder.

 

Simple task to open the email and then just copy paste into any other document that needs it.

[Campaman]

Yup, and watch out when buying online from sites that pop up your address when you enter a postcode that you choose the correct one, I have parcels delivered to work and even though I enter the address correctly the online systems sometimes put in the name of a company down the road.

[jamie92208]

I'm pleased that it all worked out for you.   It's so easy to do but there are other potential pitfalls.   We live in a village a mile and a half from our post town of Morley.  There is a Church Street in Morley which duplicates our address.   The postcodes starts with the same 4 characters but some automatic addressing systems miss out the village name that is in our address.  despite the village being LS27 7 and the other road is in LS27 9 we regualarly get mail delivered to the flat in Morley.  For many years we ahd no problem and got to know the old lady there quite well.  However the next few tannants have been less trustworthy and we got several letters for them from debt collection agencies.  We are sure that some items have gone astary   We have to be very careful when ordering stuff online that the village name appears.  if necessary I have to delete Morley and replace with Gildersome.

 

Jamie

[great central]

Final update! It arrived at the caravan site office yesterday, the 2nd despite the message saying it would be delivered on the 31st.

Looking at the tracking info, it was received at the depot late on the 1st, so where has it been? Wife is going on Wednesday for a week so she'll bring it home.

[kevinlms]

Final update! It arrived at the caravan site office yesterday, the 2nd despite the message saying it would be delivered on the 31st.

Looking at the tracking info, it was received at the depot late on the 1st, so where has it been? Wife is going on Wednesday for a week so she'll bring it home.

Your lucky. A friend of mine purchased a phone through eBay. Unfortunately, without thinking he clicked on the icon for sending to his address as already listed in eBay. Next day he realised that he'd recently moved & that eBay only had his old address! He emailed the seller to advised her of this change, only to be told, 'too late, already posted' and he'll have to wait until it gets returned from wrong address.

 

Never did turn up & his posts to her got quite nasty, with suggestions that she never had the phone to sell. Opened case with eBay, but they rejected it. So he lost his money.

 

He refused to acknowledge friends suggestions that the new owners of his old house, could have been delivered a nice, late model phone. Called the Police on this (to chase the seller), but of course they weren't interested. Vowed never to buy anything on eBay again & refused to accept that his error contributed to the loss.

[great central]

Your lucky. A friend of mine purchased a phone through eBay. Unfortunately, without thinking he clicked on the icon for sending to his address as already listed in eBay. Next day he realised that he'd recently moved & that eBay only had his old address! He emailed the seller to advised her of this change, only to be told, 'too late, already posted' and he'll have to wait until it gets returned from wrong address.

 

Never did turn up & his posts to her got quite nasty, with suggestions that she never had the phone to sell. Opened case with eBay, but they rejected it. So he lost his money.

 

He refused to acknowledge friends suggestions that the new owners of his old house, could have been delivered a nice, late model phone. Called the Police on this (to chase the seller), but of course they weren't interested. Vowed never to buy anything on eBay again & refused to accept that his error contributed to the loss.

 

I'm the first to admit that the original error was mine. I was prepared to take the loss if it really couldn't be found, as in been delivered to the wrong address, but knowing that it was undelivered made all the difference. If the courier had left it, and had it signed for at the incorrect address, it's down to the honesty of the receiving person and my mistake. However, as it was still in the possession of the parcel company or the courier, I'm darned if I'll let it rest. 

[Chimer]

Your lucky. A friend of mine purchased a phone through eBay. Unfortunately, without thinking he clicked on the icon for sending to his address as already listed in eBay. Next day he realised that he'd recently moved & that eBay only had his old address! He emailed the seller to advised her of this change, only to be told, 'too late, already posted' and he'll have to wait until it gets returned from wrong address.

 

Never did turn up & his posts to her got quite nasty, with suggestions that she never had the phone to sell. Opened case with eBay, but they rejected it. So he lost his money.

 

He refused to acknowledge friends suggestions that the new owners of his old house, could have been delivered a nice, late model phone. Called the Police on this (to chase the seller), but of course they weren't interested. Vowed never to buy anything on eBay again & refused to accept that his error contributed to the loss.

 

There is another side to that story.  A few months ago someone hijacked my e-bay and Paypal accounts, bought an iPhone5 (in gold!!) and (I discovered later) followed up by an e-mail to the seller saying "oops I've changed my address please send it here instead ..."  Luckily for me the seller knew the rules and said "No, I can't do that ...".  First I knew was an e-mail from PayPal saying my payment for £ hundreds had gone through ... I raised a dispute and eventually the payment was reversed, somehow the scammer had also intercepted the routine e-mails that e-bay send to a purchaser when a bid is made or won, but hadn't done the same for PayPal.  My faith in e-bay/PayPal retained and all passwords changed!

 

All facts including the "new" delivery address submitted to the fraud hotline but nothing heard since.

[Quarryscapes]

I'm pleased that it all worked out for you.   It's so easy to do but there are other potential pitfalls.   We live in a village a mile and a half from our post town of Morley.  There is a Church Street in Morley which duplicates our address.   The postcodes starts with the same 4 characters but some automatic addressing systems miss out the village name that is in our address.  despite the village being LS27 7 and the other road is in LS27 9 we regualarly get mail delivered to the flat in Morley.  For many years we ahd no problem and got to know the old lady there quite well.  However the next few tannants have been less trustworthy and we got several letters for them from debt collection agencies.  We are sure that some items have gone astary   We have to be very careful when ordering stuff online that the village name appears.  if necessary I have to delete Morley and replace with Gildersome.

 

Jamie

 

 

Yes you really do have to watch what the post office official address details are (as looked up by these automated online forms). Our House at Lake Vyrnwy, firmly in Mid Wales, was considered Oswestry. So my Street address in a village in rural Wales became a street address in Oswestry, I'd always make a point of filling it out as Llanwddyn, Powys of course! 

[Jongudmund]

We live in one of three streets with similar names in close proximity - Bromsgrove Street, Bradford Street and Bromfield Street.

 

Royal Mail seem to have a new postman on the beat every couple of months. The one thing they all have in common is they can't read street names!

[Andy Hayter]

And to rub salt into the wounds of those in the UK with delivery problems,  Our address in France is:

 

Name

5 digit postcode (which covers 9 towns/villages and outlying hamlets), Village name

(and for international deliveries France)

 

Amazingly things get delivered despite no street names, no house names or numbers and a postcode that gets to within 20 kilometres of its destination.

[kevinlms]

We live in one of three streets with similar names in close proximity - Bromsgrove Street, Bradford Street and Bromfield Street.

 

Royal Mail seem to have a new postman on the beat every couple of months. The one thing they all have in common is they can't read street names!

Bradford seems to be an odd one out to me!

[Jongudmund]

Bradford and Bromfield can look similar at a quick glance.

[great central]

Epilog (to borrow an American TV end piece from the 60-70s)

 

Wife arrived home with the wandering parcel yesterday, opened it this morning. All in good order. Well pleased with my purchase.

[skipepsi]

I had a similar problem with a purchase from RT models paypal had my old address (my fault) I left a note at the old house and heard nothing Robert offered to send me another kit but before he did the couple at the old house texted to say they had got the parcel each thought the other had contacted me....

[cromptonnut]

And to rub salt into the wounds of those in the UK with delivery problems,  Our address in France is:

 

Name

5 digit postcode (which covers 9 towns/villages and outlying hamlets), Village name

(and for international deliveries France)

 

Amazingly things get delivered despite no street names, no house names or numbers and a postcode that gets to within 20 kilometres of its destination.

 

Years ago (pre-internet...) I went to a church where the pastor was known to many as "Uncle Sid".  He travelled to many places around the world preaching, and one day a letter turned up from somewhere in Africa (following one of his trips) simply addressed "Uncle Sid, England".  It happened that the person in the department at Royal Mail that dealt with wrongly addressed post knew of Uncle Sid through other church connections, and it was delivered to him within 2 weeks of it being posted.

[TheQ]

Sadly putting the correct post code on it doesn't always work, I had a Courier phone up say he had just left XXX and would be in my village in 10 Minutes " where abouts was I ?" My reply was that He would be supersonic to do it that quick, as I lived in a village of the same name the other side of Norfolk. It turned out someone in the supply chain had crossed out the first part of the correct Post code, and substituted that for the other village.

 The Q

[skipepsi]

Since moving to North Wingfield we have to constantly warn repairers etc that if they use sat nav they will end up in Temple Normanton makes no sense at all....

[macgeordie]

I had a parcel sent as an Ebay purchase a while back and it was delivered by a courier. Unfortunately I wasn't home, so he put it in the 'Recycling Bin' and left a note through the door. The only problem was, he got the house number wrong and put it in my next door neighbors bin, who happened to be on holiday. By good fortune he came home the day before the Refuse men came, otherwise my nice little package would have been recycled !!!!

 

Ian

[geoffers]

Happened to me - neighbours on hols, parcel put in recycling bin, note put through door but before I checked the neighbours post (they allow me in) put out the bin for collection. Later that day (after collection) find note. Ooooops! Felt sorry for the postie (not our usual one who would try several neighbours - us first). Neighbours were OK about it fortunately but I now always check the bins before I take them out.

[Foulounoux]

I ship parcels by couriers daily and use the big names. And spend 000's per month

We have good systems to ensure we address correctly

 

Even that doesn't prevent some excursions

 

Common issues we have had

 

2 parcels 1 gets to the destination 1 goes for a tour

Destination codes get wrongly scanned or entered and parcel ends up in Prague instead of Paris

Half the parcel arrives

 

Sod's law applies to parcels all the time

 

Colin

[Andy Hayter]

And those systems that you talk about can sometimes be  Real Pain when they don't do what they are supposed to.

 

Since you are in Charente (16) you may appreciate that having a 5 digit post code that starts with a zero can be a problem.

 

There are a large number of systems that see the number as a number and ignore (as in drop) the zero.  So instead of my parcel going to 07 (Ardeche) it ends up going to 72 (Sarthe - other end of the country).  They do eventually arrive, but there can be delays - Gentlemen with the Blue boxes please note.

[Baby Deltic]

Your lucky. A friend of mine purchased a phone through eBay. Unfortunately, without thinking he clicked on the icon for sending to his address as already listed in eBay. Next day he realised that he'd recently moved & that eBay only had his old address! He emailed the seller to advised her of this change, only to be told, 'too late, already posted' and he'll have to wait until it gets returned from wrong address.

 

Never did turn up & his posts to her got quite nasty, with suggestions that she never had the phone to sell. Opened case with eBay, but they rejected it. So he lost his money.

 

He refused to acknowledge friends suggestions that the new owners of his old house, could have been delivered a nice, late model phone. Called the Police on this (to chase the seller), but of course they weren't interested. Vowed never to buy anything on eBay again & refused to accept that his error contributed to the loss.

Which is why I paid to have my post redirected by the Royal Mail when I moved.

[Foulounoux]

And those systems that you talk about can sometimes be Real Pain when they don't do what they are supposed to.

 

Since you are in Charente (16) you may appreciate that having a 5 digit post code that starts with a zero can be a problem.

 

There are a large number of systems that see the number as a number and ignore (as in drop) the zero. So instead of my parcel going to 07 (Ardeche) it ends up going to 72 (Sarthe - other end of the country). They do eventually arrive, but there can be delays - Gentlemen with the Blue boxes please note.

Actually work in the UK and French post codes are fine, it's the fact the big boys sometimes can't work out which country means we don't even get to the post code issue.

 

Oh and Ireland which doesn't have recognisable post codes the systems just reject the address. (And the new ones don't look much better )

[Sam Moss]

Had it recently where the seller had put 36 instead of 63 which my door number. Hence getting a note saying "parcel at No.52" and thinking "that's over ten doors away, why on earth is it there?" after about 4 days with no help from the seller other than "its been confirmed as delivered mate!" I by chance thought about I wonder if the wrong number has been put on. Turned out to be at No.36, across the road from No.52

 

Another is when I've had things delivered to my Gran in the next village when I've been out. Ironville is in Derbyshire but has a Nottinghamshire NG16 post code. Confuses couriers all the time. Doesn't help that there is no road sign, just a name and no door number and the postcode covers the whole lane!