http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-23727511

WTF? So a bottle is now suspicious? And if some over-zealous postal worker spots it and phones the police, the police will bill the sender for wasting their time?

Well, no, not exactly… the elected Police Commissioner (i.e. not the chief of the force or anyone who actually wears a police uniform), said he wants to claim the money back. And the package was essentially a bottle full of electronics sent from Northern Ireland, and not in the normal internal post, would that not make you wonder ever so slightly and play on the cautious side?

I thought The Bill was on ITV?

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6AEo5c_1_Q[/video]

Edit – in all seriousness though, from the mention of swiss post, I get the impression that the people who contacted the police were BBC’s own mail sorting contractors rather than the royal mail finding the package and reporting it – personally I think that makes a big difference.

Still, I send electronics stuff all the time – just got a electric bike battery in the post, and on X-ray they look very suspicious. Lots of little cylinders lined up with a circuit board.

There seems to be a recent trend for the police (or individual officers) to try to claim money from people when they’re doing their job.

parcel containing a camera in a bottle.

Not exactly normal is it. I think they are within their rights to do so. Would be nice if the BBC explained why the camera was in a bottle.

But what’s “normal”? If there was a published list of stuff you’re allowed to send, then fine, but there isn’t.

An equivalent example – imagine a neighbourhood watch person phones the police because someone is loitering suspiciously, and the police turn up and find it’s all innocent – would the police then be able to bill the loiterer for doing something that looks suspicious?

Person elected by about 10% of the population in publicity seeking exercise shocker.

There is a list of prohibited items (or was) seen it somewhere. Stuff like flammable liquids can’t remember what else. That is royal mail not other delivery companies.

http://www.royalmail.com/personal/help-and-support/Tell-me-about-Prohibited-Goods

its not a case of ‘normal’ its a case of someone at the BBC mail sorting centre saw a package that looked like a bomb which came from Northern Ireland, you can sort of see them being cautious – however the fact that there was a label on the side indicating it was from another BBC office to a named producer really should have led to them checking internally before calling out the bomb squad, surely?

It seemed prudent to call the police and it is not beyond me or anyone else to fake a label

Its also obvious the police will be called to many incidents where they dont arrest someone and no crime has occurred – do they need to bill someone every time? Surely that is what we pay them,via taxes, to do in the first place?

I fail to see why they should be charged for this as it is hardly outlandish to have applied some caution to receiving an electronic suspicious device from that country

It’s 20 years since the peace agreement – is there still such a serious worry that anything electronic from NI should be under suspicion?

But that’s not really my point – if you’ve been wasting police time, then they can charge you with “wasting police time” and take you to court – not send you an invoice.

what imnotverygood said.

No law against sending bottle and electronics in the post. Police are being a bunch of dicks.

It’s 20 years since the peace agreement – is there still such a serious worry that anything electronic from NI should be under suspicion?

isnt a well known bike shop based in the northern part of the island of ireland, and dont they call themselves chain reaction.

Best not to order anything electronic from them.