My Hermes - Missing Package & Poor Customer Service

[Edwardian]

Has anyone else had a poor experience with My Hermes?

 

As a recipient of several internet purchases delivered via My Hermes, I would have rated it a good service.

 

For the first time, however, I arranged a pick-up and collection with them.

 

A member of the community had, very kindly indeed, donated some quality reading material on a subject upon which I felt I required education.  The pick up was arranged and, I discovered, the package was collected on the correct day and a receipt left, a copy of which I have.

 

I was thrown off the scent that something had gone wrong because the online tracking showed that the parcel had not yet been collected.

 

This delayed my enquiries for a week or so, but I am now a week into trying to obtain a resolution from My Hermes, which seemingly cannot get past the fact that their collection slip has expired and that I need, therefore, to submit the package for collection! 

 

I have tried email, live chat and 'phone, and have explained the situation a good many times by now, produced the collection slip etc, and all that comes back is the inane request that I apply for another collection date.  All this from a carrier that has had the package since 29 September.

 

They are giving a good impression of an organisation that does not know what it's doing and which cares even less.

 

Losing a package is one thing, but the appalling lack of customer service is, if anything, worse!

 

Anyone any similar experiences or advice?

 

At this stage I am open to simple condolences!

Edited October 13, 2017 by Edwardian

[mezzoman253]

Has anyone else had a poor experience with My Hermes?

 

As a recipient of several internet purchases delivered via My Hermes, I would have rated it a good service.

 

For the first time, however, I arranged a pick-up and collection with them.

 

A member of the community had, very kindly indeed, donated some quality reading material on a subject upon which I felt I required education.  The pick up was arranged and, I discovered, the package was collected on the correct day and a receipt left, a copy of which I have.

 

I was thrown off the scent that something had gone wrong because the online tracking showed that the parcel had not yet been collected.

 

This delayed my enquiries for a week or so, but I am now a week into trying to obtain a resolution from My Hermes, which seemingly cannot get past the fact that their collection slip has expired and that I need, therefore, to submit the package for collection! 

 

I have tried email, live chat and 'phone, and have explained the situation a good many times by now, produced the collection slip etc, and all that comes back is the inane request that I apply for another collection date.  All this from a carrier that has had the package since 29 September.

 

They are giving a good impression of an organisation that does not know what it's doing and which cares even less.

 

Losing a package is one thing, but the appalling lack of customer service is, if anything, worse!

 

Anyone any similar experiences or advice?

 

At this stage I am open to simple condolences!

Milage varies with Hermes, some get good service , many others very poor. Personally I wouldn't use them and avoid sellers who do use them.

 

The main problem is the delvery/pick up people are self employed and don't want to have a failed delivery/pick up as it costs them time and money. So you get "deliveries" thrown over the back gate, etc ,etc.

 

There's a thread on here somewhere re delivery companies in general that runs to several pages, and Hermes features a lot in that, not in a good way mostly.

 

Condolences.

 

Rob

[chris p bacon]

^^^^

 

And yet I've never had a problem with them either sending or receiving (3 parcels a week on average). I have had DHL falsify a signature and leave a very expensive parcel in the open on the doorstep which they denied until I suggested I would send the cctv footage.

 

There's good and bad in everything.

[NorthBrit]

^^^^

 

And yet I've never had a problem with them either sending or receiving (3 parcels a week on average). I have had DHL falsify a signature and leave a very expensive parcel in the open on the doorstep which they denied until I suggested I would send the cctv footage.

 

There's good and bad in everything.

Likewise I have never had a problem with Hermes and will continue to use them.

[tomparryharry]

One of the newer delivery companies uses the BBMF, and some retired   personnel.

 

Just load up the Lancaster, and go on a 'delivery run'. Should get 10 tons in one delivery.

 

For the 'pathfinder' service, you get a DH mosquito to accurately drop a 'chute flare, one in each corner of your garden.

 

Carpet bombing is not for the fainthearted, especially if the pattern is wrong. "Does the client need underlay?"

 

Ian.

[Mark Saunders]

It is all down to the last leg in the chain some are good and others not and it applies to all couriers including Royal Mail!

 

Mark Saunders

[Edwardian]

Thanks.

 

I can see where it goes wrong with a particular individual at the end of the chain, but it is the indifference and incompetence of "customer support" that gets me.

 

Things will go wrong. An organisation is only as good as how it behaves when they do.

[bescotbeast]

^^^^

 

And yet I've never had a problem with them either sending or receiving (3 parcels a week on average). I have had DHL falsify a signature and leave a very expensive parcel in the open on the doorstep which they denied until I suggested I would send the cctv footage.

 

There's good and bad in everything.

I've sent over 150 parcels with MyHermes and only had one problem that was resolved to my satisfaction, I'd much rather use them than Royal Mail and our local courier is a lovey friendly chap.

[Edwardian]

I've sent over 150 parcels with MyHermes and only had one problem that was resolved to my satisfaction, I'd much rather use them than Royal Mail and our local courier is a lovey friendly chap.

 

But, this being the first time I have used My Hermes, and it having gone badly wrong and remaining unresolved, you can hopefully appreciate how I have a rather different perspective!

 

I am getting the impression that service is patchy.  I've obviously hit one of their bad patches!

 

No excuse for them not sorting it out, however.

Edited October 13, 2017 by Edwardian

[Horsetan]

We get mail and packages delivered to us by Hermes, and they seem alright since we are a business address. They did once take 26 days to deliver an item which they had told the sender would only take 48 hours.

 

Never used them for actually sending stuff out, though.

[letterspider]

With Hermes it helps if you have a good delivery driver, they get to 'know' you and when you are unlikely to be at home and will make the effort to leave your parcels with neighbours.

On the whole and in my own experience, Hermes is cheaper than Royal Mail, damage / loss of parcels currently at about 1% while Royal Mail about 2 to 3%.  they are also less likely to quibble over compensation.

In addition you don't have to go into a post office to get proof of postage for uninsured items.

 

There are other options available but I certainly wouldn't recommend using Parcel Monkey as they are 'in betweeners' bulk buying the service and passing on savings to you however when things go wrong (and they eventually do) you find you cannot communicate with the original courier.

 

Take what you want from the above

[70b]

I'm with Edwardian, based on limited contact, several things not delivered that I suspect they recycled, then more recently they became related to the Timelords as I had notification of a successful delivery here, an hour or so before it arrived, which I found quite impressive, but only after I stopped fretting where it had gone for an hour and had disturbed everybody else in the postcode. I don't use shops that send by Hermes if I can help it, and never would use them for outgoings either

[Quarryscapes]

I'm with Edwardian, based on limited contact, several things not delivered that I suspect they recycled, then more recently they became related to the Timelords as I had notification of a successful delivery here, an hour or so before it arrived, which I found quite impressive, but only after I stopped fretting where it had gone for an hour and had disturbed everybody else in the postcode. I don't use shops that send by Hermes if I can help it, and never would use them for outgoings either

 

Same here, don't use myself and avoid sellers that do. I've even got credit with them from when they failed to collect 3 days in a row, on day 4 it was collected by DHL and delivered successfully and Hermes have not been used since. The girl I spoke to several times at their CS dept seemed genuinely helpful, but at the end of the day of the guy driving the van is a useless berk than that's the level of service you get. 

[Siberian Snooper]

They allegedly delivered a parcel to me, left under the green wheelie bin inside my back gate! I don't have a back gate, or entrance come to that and at that time I didn't have a wheelie bin either.

Hattons were very good and sent a replacement, I have no idea what has happened since.

[BG John]

I had a delivery recently, but didn't hear a knock at the door (probably due to overexcited dog, whose bark is louder than the bell!). I thought I ought to check their tracking system to find out when it was due, and found it had been delivered and "left in a safe place". Going out to look, I found the safe place was my letter box, that's on the front gate. A pretty good place to leave it. But also in the box was a card from them, saying it had been left in the box!

[jjb1970]

I agree with those who have commented that it all seems to depend on your local delivery driver. In the early days of these low cost delivery services I had a couple of bad experiences and didn't think very highly of them but since then I've found that some of the delivery drivers go to great lengths to offer a great service and go far beyond anything I see from RM.

[Nearholmer]

My one experience was exceedingly bad.

 

I bought something from a guy in southern France. The parcel slowly toured the sorting depots of France, always veering off at the last moment when it got near a channel port, then disappeared into a depot just north of Paris, never to be seen again.

 

All attempts to get service from Hermes, by the sender, his wife, and myself, failed; the organisation hides itself behind layers of 'systems' that it's own staff in both countries seem baffled by.

 

In the end the sender reimbursed me, and found himself unable to recover anything from Hermes.

[chris p bacon]

My one experience was exceedingly bad.

 

I bought something from a guy in southern France. The parcel slowly toured the sorting depots of France, always veering off at the last moment when it got near a channel port, then disappeared into a depot just north of Paris, never to be seen again.

 

All attempts to get service from Hermes, by the sender, his wife, and myself, failed; the organisation hides itself behind layers of 'systems' that it's own staff in both countries seem baffled by.

 

In the end the sender reimbursed me, and found himself unable to recover anything from Hermes.

 

You learn something new, I didn't think they did outside of the UK.

[Horsetan]

.....the organisation hides itself behind layers of 'systems' that it's own staff in both countries seem baffled by.

All modern businesses aspire to eventually be able to do this. That's my theory anyway.

[Nearholmer]

Russ - they are a German company, and I think the biggest logistics firm in Europe. They do a lot more than parcel couriering, having diversified into a combination of logistic and supply chain.

 

K

[jjb1970]

All modern businesses aspire to eventually be able to do this. That's my theory anyway.

I think it depends on the company and what sort of space in the market they're trying to operate in. While I've seen this plenty of times I also have plenty of experience of first class customer service, although not a rule and there are certainly exceptions my experience does lead me to believe it comes back to you get what you pay for.

[Norm81]

I avoid them like the plague, after the local delivery guy didn't leave my package and signed proof of delivery himself! Was a struggle to get reimbursed by the sender.

[laurenceb]

Friend of mine substitutes a "p" for the "m".He has a very low opinian of them

[bescotbeast]

With Hermes it helps if you have a good delivery driver, they get to 'know' you and when you are unlikely to be at home and will make the effort to leave your parcels with neighbours.

 

This is why we have such a good experience, our delivery chap is great and very friendly, if we are out, we don't have an issue with him leaving the package in our recycling boxes. My Father-in-law did have a lazy delivery driver who claimed he couldn't find the address after two attempts even though you can find them on a map or with a Sat-Nav.

Edited October 15, 2017 by bescotbeast

[Bernard Lamb]

The Commons business committee has had talks with the representatives of Hermes, Uber and Deliveroo.

My experience lumps them all in one category and it seems the watchdog does as well.

I suppose any further comment would be getting into politics.

The bottom line is you get what you pay for.

Bernard