Like many people in the 21st century, I shop online a lot. But I groan when I see an online retailer is going to send me my items by Royal Mail. Because of all the delivery companies they are by far the worst at actually getting a parcel into my hands.
Firstly there is delivery time. Most days I am out in the morning. Royal Mail do not care about this because they always deliver parcels to my house at about 11am. Every time. The last 5 parcels delivered by Royal Mail have all arrived at between 11am and 11:10am. I can't remember a parcel ever arriving before 11am or after 1pm.
In fact the only time I ever get a parcel first time from Royal Mail is on the odd occasion when they deliver on a Saturday.
So, redelivery maybe. Well why would I ask them to try to redeliver it when I know they are probably just going to come at 11am again when I am out? Duh.
So, collection it is then.
I live quite close to the Post Office in Guildford, so this should be easy. But this is Royal Mail not the Post Office (as I was told rather curtly by a Royal Mail employee once). And the Royal Mail collection office is right out on the other edge of town... well away from public transport.
Most people drive there, on a Saturday morning. There are about 6 customer car parking spaces. But these are usually occupied by Royal Mail staff. I know this because once I walked there (I don't have a car) and all the spaces were full despite me being the only customer there... I asked the man at the desk why the customer parking was full when I was the only customer there... and he muttered something about it not really being customer parking any more.
Usually I go in the afternoon when it is quiet. But if you do have to go on a Saturday morning then I pity you, because there is often a long queue.
So you hand over your red card and if you remembered to bring ID then they go off to find your parcel. Sometimes this takes them a while... so you have time to look around. There are big notices up that say "NO MOBILE PHONES TO BE USED IN THIS AREA PLEASE!!!!!". Yes, that is 5 exclamation marks.
What happens if someone uses a mobile phone in that area? Does the whole postal system crash? I don't understand why they are so worried about this. Not so much that they have to SHOUT IT AT YOU while you wait.
There are also signs asking you to respect the employees. Which I guess means they have a lot of people in who are cross and take it out on the employees. I'm not going to condone bad behaviour... but I can certainly understand why some people rocking up there, not being able to park, then waiting a long time for a parcel that they would rather have received at their home (as they paid for), might not be feeling at their best by the time they get served.
Once I had to wait more than 10 minutes for them to find my parcel. You would think they had a decent system for this by now...
What would help?
This is the 21st century. Many households are empty during the day. Delivering everything 9-5 is stupid. Delivering everything at the same time to a household when no-one is in is even more stupid.
Why can't I specify a preferred time? Why can't you even try delivering in the afternoon? That doesn't seem so hard.
Why do you return parcels to an out-of-town delivery office, when I live near the Post Office? Why can't I specify a preferred collection point?
At some point I am going to stop shopping with online companies that use Royal Mail and only use the ones that use other couriers. Because I have given you every chance to get into the 21st century... and you have failed!
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