Royal Mail delivery

[creditwheredue]

I?ve got post arriving sent last week, bills of course, and packages still outstanding from late November.

[spark67]

Just received xmas cards from family posted 5th december in Marlow, same happened with birthday cards, two weeks late.

Also received hospital letter today posted the 6th

[KateFord]

I received a few scraps of mail an hour ago. One postmarked on Dec 2 and another Dec 13. I know there is a huge chunk missing from friends and family posted in December though. I imagine there is a huge mountain to get through and they are just grabbing random handfuls as there seems to be no correlation to dates. I don?t understand why the temps weren?t kept on to get through the backlog as I expect to be receiving mail posted during December well into 2022.

[sand12]

Haven't received any post or parcels via Royal Mail and their subsidiary ParcelForce for over two weeks. Missed medical and hygiene supplies in addition to Christmas presents, cards, and hospital reports. No justification for this other than greed and mismanagement.

Official complaints don't seem to be getting anywhere nor are appeals via the MPs or councillors.

Might be time to start an official news and social media campaign to bring more scrutiny and pressure on the service to make changes?

[RichH]

Royal Mail was privatised over 8 years ago and the service here was perfectly fine until they closed the Silvester Road site (the reasons for which have been discussed at great length elsewhere.) That, together with the pandemic, is the likely reason for the recent very poor service.

There are around 1300-1400 Delivery Offices in the UK and 99% of them are providing a normal (good) service. Of the few offices currently listed as having problems many are in London and South London in particular. That, I would infer, is due to postal staff being off sick with COVID-19 or having to self-isolate. This, of course, has an impact on the ability to hire more temporary staff as there are too few regular staff around to show the temps. what to do.

Deliveries will no doubt begin to pick up again as the regular postal staff recover and are able to return to work.

Courier companies like Hermes, DPD, DHL et al, whilst also affected, likely don't have quite so much of a problem as they don't generally have to deliver to almost every address across the entire country (including Highlands and Islands) 6 days a week.

[Sue]

RichH Wrote:

----------------------------------------------

> Courier companies like Hermes, DPD, DHL et al,

> whilst also affected, likely don't have quite so

> much of a problem as they don't generally have to

> deliver to almost every address across the entire

> country (including Highlands and Islands) 6 days a

> week.

I can't see how delivering to relatively far flung places affects delivery in South East London?

Surely the only impact of that is on Royal Mail's overall staffing, transport and delivery office costs, and those won't have changed significantly since privatisation.

What has changed is Royal Mail now having to deliver (pun not intentional) a profit to its shareholders.

Which directly led, so far as I can see, to the almagamation of the ED delivery office with Peckham's, instead of finding a local alternative to the Sylvester Road office if that was no longer fit for purpose (as Royal Mail claimed).

[sandyman]

Just out of interest, we are up near Dulwich Library - how do posties based at Peckham get here - do they get dropped off? Is their mail dropped off locally and they pick it up up here? I'm guessing they don't have to walk all the way from Highshore Road, although that would certainly explain why the post - when it comes at all - tends to come around lunchtime.

Also I notice there's a sorting office in Forest Hill - so what's the furthest south the Peckham office covers?

[GinnyP]

On Christmas Eve I walked to the sorting office on Highshore Road because, after two weeks, my partner was still waiting for his replacement debit card. On the way I met a postie out delivering - a rare sight indeed! I asked them what was going on and to summarise was told it was chaos at the sorting office. There weren't enough people to sort the post and Royal Mail don't care about delivering letters because it's not profitable for them. The only way to get anything delivered at the moment is to complain - something I've done more times than I can remember. They said they felt ashamed of what Royal Mail has become.

When I reached the sorting office, I was handed a single item of post - junk mail from an estate agent. My partner had visited them three days earlier and was given one solitary Christmas card and a letter for me marked 'NHS - Important Documents'. I asked the person on the counter when deliveries were likely to begin again. They shrugged and said maybe in mid January.

Over Christmas I had to explain to my uncle that a cheque he had sent me inside a Christmas card hadn't arrived. He was having difficulty understanding that Christmas wasn't being delivered in East Dulwich.

This morning I phoned King College Hospital because I had an appointment in the afternoon and hadn't had a reminder which was odd. I was told my appointment had been changed and that a letter had been sent to me. I never received that letter. I have had other hospital letters this year that have arrived too late or not at all. I phoned Royal Mail and made a complaint. Moments later a parcel was delivered, shortly followed by three letters. One was a Christmas card for my partner, another was junk mail for another address and the third was a letter for someone who moved out at least nine years ago. Where was the rest of our Christmas post? Or the calendar I'd ordered in plenty of time. Where was my partner's bank card? He's been paying with cash for the last three weeks which is hardly ideal! I know my phone call had nothing to do with the post we received today. Someone else had complained before me.

This just won't do. We shouldn't have to spend time chasing up post that Royal Mail has been paid to deliver. I'm so sick of this, of the appalling service and of the lack of any real will to fix things properly. I'm tired. I'm battling long term poor mental health whilst trying to do an MA. I get tired very easily. Are there any plans to try to make Royal Mail do their job properly? And I'm talking about the bosses and the owners here. Something has to be done about it.

[KidKruger]

sandyman Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Just out of interest, we are up near Dulwich

> Library - how do posties based at Peckham get here

> - do they get dropped off? Is their mail dropped

> off locally and they pick it up up here?

>

From what I see they get dropped off / a PO van is parked and used as a mini depot.

It seems CP Rd is the usual route from Highshore Rd, using vans that appear to be governed at 35+mph.

[jazzer]

My post comes from FH sorting office; A parcel was sent to me first class from Cornwall on 20th December still has not arrived?? Had one piece of post today, a statement, still no cards.

Was told that FH sorting office just before Christmas had refused two lorries from Croydon depot as did not have the staff to sort it due to sickness & Covid, where are the usual temps, have seen none this year?? Maybe none employed.

24th December saw at least one postie with a PO trolley full to the brim, so some people appear to be receiving some post.

I've seen a van parked up on Underhill on more than a few occasions doing deliveries (after stopping to have a long chat with another postie van)

However, it feels very much like post is being held back due to staffing and when it finally does come, expect an avalanche through the letter boxes.

[Bic Basher]

A bank statement today and nothing else after a week of no post.

[gkb]

As well as all the stated concerns regarding undelivered items containing personal details, I don?t know how ?secure? all the undelivered items are, but I feel very concerned about the potential of identity fraud, and feel completely powerless.

[intexasatthe moment]

I spoke to a postman on Barry Road yesterday .He said letters /cards were in their slots .So I'm guessing they are largely sorted ?

I'm beginning to brainstorm here and wondering if Highshore Road could have some dedicated open days where eg residents of certain postcodes could come down with ID and collect their post themselves?

[intexasatthe moment]

Yesterday ,29th Dec ,we received one card posted 16 Dec . I don't understand how one piece of post gets picked up and delivered and not others .

Could it be that the sole item we got through the door had been caught up with another resident's bundle and then kindly onwardly delivered by that resident ? I know I've had occasion to do this .

[dulwichquine]

Still missing our Christmas post. Had a very small delivery yesterday, first in more than two weeks. But waiting for rest of it. Really disappointing performance. How long can this go on for?

[KidKruger]

It?ll go on indefinitely, until it?s convenient for RM to address it, it started way before Xmas or the pandemic, meanwhile shareholders win (I assume, I haven?t checked progress of share value).

Considering the ED sorting office was considered unviable before RM closed it, the impact of closing it seems significant !

[Lynne]

I believe the email address of the current chairman, Stuart Simpson is [email protected]

We all know that complains will have no effect, but I feel something should be done

[BrandNewGuy]

Well, if you are a shareholder, you've made a pretty p*sspoor investment given the performance of the rest of the stock market over the past eight years.

[Jacqui5254]

No post for nearly three weeks except yesterday received a birthday card posted 12th December...sigh.

[Lynne]

3 cars today!

One had only taken 4 weeks to get from Nottingham

[Hare]

Information (although some similar to that offered elsewhere) about the Highshore Road delivery service and a question relating to the second part, for the purpose of deciding whether there is a wider issue that I should pursue or if it is an isolated incident.

Information: 1. On the Monday before Christmas, I was sweeping leaves at the front of the house when I heard what sounded like a vehicle engine in severe distress. It was a postal delivery van and it stopped on the road by me. As the driver got out, I commented that Royal Mail needed to get the van to a garage before it caused any harm.

The driver was very good-humoured and told me that he actually did a domestic round on foot, but that the sorting office was so far behind with parcel deliveries that on his return that morning, he had been asked to take this van out and work a driving shift. He explained that even this van was in constant use and that he?d taken it over from a worker who?d just finished their shift so there was no chance they were going to put it in the garage.

He described the wider postal service as being in chaos as a result of covid infection and other, seasonal, absences but believed that relative to other sorting offices, Highshore Road was just about managing to cope.

2. Close friends in Germany called a couple of days ago to tell us that the parcel they had sent to us on 5th December, with perishable Christmas goodies inside, had just been returned to them. It had travelled all the way to the sorting office, then had a label attached to say that it couldn?t be delivered and that no-one had come to collect it so was being returned to the senders.

There has not been a moment in the last two months when the house hasn?t had someone in, and since anything that is put through the letter box is really easy to see in the hallway (no hiding places) it?s clear that no delivery note was actually completed and delivered. Added to this, our neighbour across the road works from a desk that looks straight at our front door and in the past, has regularly received unexpected postal deliveries on our behalf; they saw no failed delivery during this time period either.

Question: is anyone else aware of packages that were destined for them but have been returned by the sorting office to sender, with no apparent attempt having been made to deliver?

[Castleton]

I'm wondering if this is what happened to my NZ parcel, sort of. I received a missed delivery card but it was never redelivered, despite me having a confirmation of the booking.

Now the reference number is 'unrecognised' but I'm doubtful it is on it's way back to NZ

Question: is anyone else aware of packages that were destined for them but have been returned by the sorting office to sender, with no apparent attempt having been made to deliver?

[Sue]

I had six cards delivered today, one posted on 9 December.

Plus a replacement SIM card posted a fortnight ago ... Luckily in the end not needed.

I am still waiting for two items relating to a new bank account opened weeks ago 😡

[Sue]

Lynne Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I believe the email address of the current

> chairman, Stuart Simpson is

> [email protected]

>

> We all know that complains will have no effect,

> but I feel something should be done.

Probably better to complain via Helen Hayes (who I know is already on the case and has been since before the ED delivery office was closed).

I only say this because a) the chairman won't be picking up his own emails, a minion in his office will be and b) unless things have changed, the chairman's office prioritises complaints from MPs, which have to be answered within a certain time scale. If memory serves, it used to be two weeks.

Complaints, including those from members of the public, just get shunted down the line to the relevant department for some other minion to investigate (if necessary) and draft a reply in due course.

Decades (it feels like centuries) ago, I was one of those minions 🤣

Letters from MPs were in those days called "flag cases" and draft responses had to get back to the chairman's office PDQ 🤣 This was before the days of email .....

But also, Helen Hayes can put together all the complaints she gets and make a stronger case for something to be done than just a trickle of one off complaints to the chairman from different people.

Not, I agree, that that seems to have had any effect so far.

I can't understand why the Peckham office isn't taking on casuals. Surely it wouldn't cost that much?

[intexasatthe moment]

If some of the post is sorted and sitting waiting to be delivered wouldn't it help if individuals could go down and collect it ?