For help, advice and discussion about stuff not related to aviation. Play nice: no religion, no politics and no axe grinding please.
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By PeteSpencer
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1821724
If we’re considering quick delivery : just after we moved into this house a couple years ago I ordered a Sony TV for a guest bedroom :lol: :lol: :lol: online from John Lewis at 21.00 hours on a Saturday evening .

I picked it up just before midday the following morning during our Sunday shop at Waitrose just around the corner from us:

15 hours .......

( we knew the model as we’d already bought one identical before for the kitchen :lol: :lol:)
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By rikur_
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1821725
Boxkite wrote:Meanwhile, Hermes has just delivered a parcel 23 hours (120 miles) from the time of paying for it on Ebay. This was just their standard delivery service, nothing special.

I suspect Hermes have a consistency issue. I've had no issues with them, (sent 24 parcels with them in the last year), and probably received similar. Our local Hermes delivery lady is as well known in the village as the postie, and is always quick to respond on social media if anyone is having an issue (which usually seem to arise from the cover on the days that she doesn't work, implying it relies on the quality of the individual somewhat)
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By rikur_
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1821727
PeteSpencer wrote:If we’re considering quick delivery ....

The record I've had for an online order to date was ordering a picnic bench from Argos at 3.45pm, and it being delivered at 6.30pm.
By riverrock
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1821741
I ordered using Amazon Fresh various food items.
They were with me in 55min.

I remember the days I used to go into shops. Things were on shelves ready to be picked up immediately - pay using a machine as I left. Now that was fast.

Hermes I have no confidence in. Ordered sink from Germany. It was set by the courier on its side in my door step not particularly carefully, with dents in the box. Opened to find 2 corners with minor damage matching dents in the box.
Seller sent an immediate replacement.
This time I decided to check and open box before Hermes driver left. Sink was cracked down the middle.
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By Flyingfemme
#1821751
Hermes are very variable. I dispatched an aircraft part to Scotland on December 30th for delivery in 4 days. On day 4 their tracking said it was “with the local depot” for delivery. Two weeks later it was still “ with the local depot”, except I tracked them down and spoke to them, and it wasn’t. By this time the aircraft was long gone. I called Hermes, with great difficulty, and requested the package returned to me. And waited. A couple of days ago the airport maintenance man came by the hangar with my parcel. It had been dumped outside the airport gate with zero contact............a couple of hours later I got an email from Hermes, apologising, pointing me at their compensation claim form for lost goods.......
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By kanga
#1821769
Flyingfemme wrote:Hermes are very variable. I dispatched an aircraft part to Scotland on December 30th for delivery in 4 days........


<nostalgia :oops: >

ISTR from my airline days (50+ years ago :? ) that all of British Railways Parcels, British Road Services and Royal Mail Parcels had an AOG ('Aircraft on Ground') priority service, which IIRC never failed :thumright: However, it may then have been that they also then still enjoyed some residual, possibly from wartime, monopoly privileges which constrained the development of private courier services. In those days, too, coaches offered a parcel courier service in custody of the driver, and the 'Black and White' route network effectively made this a nationwide one.

But I also remember the destination of my first landaway in the FC where I completed my UK PPL being changed at the last minute from that which I had carefully planned. The CFI told me to go to Kidlington instead .. to pick up a part from CSE for another aircraft in his fleet!

</>
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By ChampChump
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1821773
Paultheparaglider wrote:Quite right @Rob L . We haven't yet had an encyclopaedia salesman, or a trick or treater in all the time we have lived here. :wink:

We do get a few of these noisy visitors, though:

Image


And there's the answer to your postal deliveries. :D





Well, sort of.
By Paultheparaglider
#1821777
Funnily enough, CC, one year a friend decided to deliver our Christmas card by airmail. He tied a streamer to the card and tossed it out through the dv window. Unfortunately, he managed to get the streamer caught up in the dv window, and the result was the window dropped nicely in the garden whereas the card drifted across to the other side of the river. It took me ages to drive around to the other side of the river, walk for several miles, and then hunt around to find the card.

I also then had a long drive to return the dv window.

We decided it might not be such a good idea to do that again. :wink:
mick w, Nick, Charles Hunt and 3 others liked this
By avtur3
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1821792
cotterpot wrote:You can now use a postbox for parcels. There is a list of locations on the link.

https://www.royalmail.com/d8/parcel-post-boxes


Herein lies the Royal Mails problem. the implementation of this idea is far from user friendly, the idea itself may not be so bad, but they make it so difficult to use.

If you follow the link sure there is a list of parcel post box locations, but it is not presented in a searchable format, it is simply a list arranged in alphabetical order by postal towm. To enlist anymore help you have to download the 'app', (with which you have to register to use) within the app you are supposed to be able to type in your postcode and get a list of nearby parcel post boxes. But in fact, you have to spend some time figuring out how the app works before you stand a chance of getting a useful result. Amongst other things the app tells me there is a post office in my village, well there was until it closed 14 years ago :shock: .

Then there is print your own postage via the website, another great idea, you'd have thought that this facility would provide an easy route to printing your own self-adhesive labels, perhaps with a convenient link to 'Avery' templates. No, the document it provides at the end of the process is an A4 sized 'pdf file', that has to be printed onto an A4 page, where you can cut out the actual mailing label which is 1/4 of an A4 page (... is that A7?) and then you use either a sellotape or prit-stick type glue to fix the label onto the envelope/package. Print your own postage at home is a good idea but the implementation is very poor, it's like they never test what they produce with real people.

We enjoy good service from our local Royal Mail delivery folks, they're great people but I worry about the system they work in.
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By rikur_
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1821799
We renewed our passports last weekend. For whatever reason, the passport service gave two different addresses to return our old passports, one in Durham, one in Liverpool. Both posted via RoyalMail 48 hour tracked at the local post office last weekend. The Durham one arrived on Tuesday, the Liverpool one is still awaiting delivery.

Good service has to be consistently good service - and that's the hard part to provide. In many markets it's relatively easy to provide a 'happy path' service when you're not too busy, when staff sickness isn't a problem, when goods work first time, when your subcontractors are performing well, etc etc ..... it's how you continue to provide a good service when things go wrong that differentiates suppliers.
By simon32
#1821801
I have the impression that Royal Mail has slowed down. We received a Christmas card yesterday in France and I have stopped ordering eBay items from UK sellers as they take so long to arrive, previously it would be around 4 days, now more like 7-10 days. The French Mail (La Poste) seems to have performed well during the epidemic and I have not noticed any delays.
However, if you need to ship anything to Latvia I strongly advise against using the post. Latvia post is considered one of the worst in Europe and I have personal experience of its egregious inefficiency.
Simon
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By skydriller
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1821812
simon32 wrote:The French Mail (La Poste) seems to have performed well during the epidemic and I have not noticed any delays.


Not in my experience. Is a week normal for national mail? 3-4 days for same Department? (tracked delivery) Im pretty sure we are only getting delivery every other day here.
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