What royal mail really need to do is to allow items to be held at the sorting office rather than attempting delivery at all. i.e. by allowing you to get items sent to JOE BLOGS C/O DORCHESTER SORTING OFFICE, the postie would then just slip a red card through the door stating x items are waiting for you to collect

Erm, and how would the postie do that if he hasn’t got your address. Sure mine hasn’t memorised the few thousand names on his walk…

Actually, the whole idea of leaving with neighbours is exactly the opposite of what you want – they don’t want thousands of parcels at the office that someone has to handle for collection. Cheaper that way for them.

the sooner the supermarkets get the contract for parcels from royal fail mail the better.

What, would that be the ASDA just round the corner, or the Tescos 10 miles away?

Supermarkets will never do this. It’ll take up too much valuable space that they won’t be able to profit from. Even taking into account the “I’m picking up a parcel from Lidl, I’ll just get a pint of milk while I’m here” scenario.

Amazon are going to deliver to local stores.

A kiosk at my local supermarket would be ideal. Could just pop in and pick up aprcels after the shop. They are open at sensible hours as well so I could go after work at my convenience.

Wiggle already use a different type of return service. I just dropped my parcel off at the local corner shop (again open early till late). If they coudl arrange to have it delivered there and me pick it up as well that would be grand.

Royal mail just about works for me at the minute. I can get to the sorting office on the way to work or just about get to the post office after work. Would be nice if they could do an evening delivery service though or just leave it at the depot so it doesn’t take 48hours before I can go and get it.

Didn’t quite understand why it took them so long to deliver over the entire day to residentail addresses. I don’t care whether he comes at 9.30 or 4.30 as I’m not in at either time.

Pain in the ass for us Posties walk up to door knock no ones in, trys next door neighbour no ones in, walks to the other neighbour who is in and hands over package.Then walks back to the orginal address and writes out a card to say we have left it with neighbour B.
We are stretched already with the parcels and this is only going to heap more pressure on the Postie!!
Idea for all you whingers out there when we leave a sorry you could not be arsed to be in card how about a secure storage container with the padlock left open so we can deposit the items then secure save everybody the hassle suggested to a few of my customers and it works well.

Do i have to opt out to opt in then?
My options for opting are compromised, if i opt in does that mean i opt out or vice versa
What happens if i nail my letterbox shut is that a silent opt in or an aggresive opt out

Thats it i am out !

breatheeasy – Member

the sooner the supermarkets get the contract for parcels from royal fail mail the better.

What, would that be the ASDA just round the corner, or the Tescos 10 miles away?

Supermarkets will never do this. It’ll take up too much valuable space that they won’t be able to profit from. Even taking into account the “I’m picking up a parcel from Lidl, I’ll just get a pint of milk while I’m here” scenario.

But as they did with a few couriers , a few years ago at petrol stations install large lockers outside so that peeps can pick up their parcels when they like witha key card.

OR CUSTOMERS CAN HAVE A LARGE LOCKER OUTSIDE THEIR HOUSE , LEFT OPENAND WHEN A PARCEL ARIVES, THE POSTIE JUST LOCKS IT DOWN

We are stretched already with the parcels and this is only going to heap more pressure on the Postie!!

Do you actually take them out?? I’ve lived in a few places where the cards just get taken.

Total bollocks! 😕

You might not do it, but my old postman did this so often I ended up making a complaint about him. If you’re in and waiting for something important and a card gets put through your door it gets pretty irritating quite quickly!

I’ve caught our local postie delivering a card to my door without even knocking, on opening the door he looked very shocked and had no explanation as to where my parcel was. It turned up an hour later.

I’m not impressed at having to opt out, without being told. I don’t want my parcels being given tk neighbours for 2 reasons…
1 – I don’t get on with my immediate neighbour and don’t want them knowing what I’ve bought.
2 – I’ve had this in the past and neighbours have gone away on holiday leaving me no access tk my post. If it just went back to where I know its safe I could collect when I got chance.

More often than not these days I get stuff sent to work, its easier in my case.

Total bollocks!

Really – next day deliveries and gettting the sorry you were out card without knocking. Open door ask for parcel – er must have been yesterdays er er bye

repeatedly – I never got one parcel at that house.

once we moved to the country again just left with neighbours on in the shed. Much better.

For postierich the issue may be the amount to carry but for the consumer it’s getting the service we paid for – which was delivery to our door. If there was a cheaper option for delivery to hub then text to confirm and opening hours long enough for those of us who work 8-5 to collect then I would have taken it.

Really struggling to see the issue here especially after reading the actual RM link in the OP.

I would also hesitate to frame any of this in the context of the RM being a profitable company. Since 2008 revenues have trended between £9.2 and £9.6bn operating profit has been very volatile and cash flow negative in three of the last five years. In FY12, revenues were up, op profit was positive (£211m) as was cash flow…..but crucially 2012 results excluded pension payments which in 2011 totalled £292m. You can take you own view on how the numbers are being “presented” in the run up to privatisation (its all here on their website) but you have to love a national accounting system that transfers the assets to the Government but not the liabilities. How many businesses can run like that!

RM still runs on very poor operating margins (absolute and relative) and it’s core business – delivering parcels to the UK – remains loss making. I don’t know, but that may give some context to these proposals. We must be lucky as we have excellent postman who already uses his discretion and does a brilliant job.

When my best mate started as a postie he said he, in youthful ignorance/laziness, didn’t take out parcels and just the red cards. Got copped pretty quickly by someone he ‘thought’ wouldn’t be in so he’s never done it since.

Problem with the Wiggle returns at local shops is you know someone is going to collect the return parcels once a day. And, to be fair, there isn’t many of them normally. Once you start getting to levels of the Royal Mail and people not being able to collect them due to working hours until the weekend, you’d have a massive pile taking over the whole shop, so it’d sharp get unworkable.

I’m not impressed at having to opt out, without being told.

so you didn’t read the bit where they were going to tell everyone in a letter about the plan and explain how you could opt out then

I’m not impressed at having to opt out, without being told. I don’t want my parcels being given tk neighbours for 2 reasons…
1 – I don’t get on with my immediate neighbour and don’t want them knowing what I’ve bought.
2 – I’ve had this in the past and neighbours have gone away on holiday leaving me no access tk my post. If it just went back to where I know its safe I could collect when I got chance.

Firstly, you will be told. By letter.

Secondly, when you are told, by letter, you can opt out.

(non) problem solved.

Nice to have some input from a real postperson namely postierich. 🙂 I guess there wasn’t any consultation involving posties? Do take your point though, more work really.

Must confess to not having thought about the whole subject, it was the execution that hacked me off and most of you completely failed to understand my point. 🙄

Anyway, notwithstanding the rather dubious packages arriving randomly at C_G Towers, I am happy to visit the Sorting Office with its smiley and helpful staff.

Oh yes, a neighbour took in a parcel from Wiggle. I spotted a glint so felt it was necessary to explain that Wiggle were a cycling retailer. Not sure whether I was believed!

another postie here…
we delivered a door to door item explaining all of the information regarding the new service. i’m guessing that it was another management idea tested out on a computer! there wasnt any conultation with us posties and as postierich pointed out it will be more work for us. think about it…. having to knock at your door for a parcle then walking up to another house and knocking, when they are not in having to then walk back write the card out and post it. on my delivery (which is a paired delivery working out of a van to over 1200 houses)that wouldnt be practical.
to all those having a moan….yes there are some crappy postmen out there but the majority of us are doing the job properly and are having to cope with increaingly large deliveris and an increaseing ammount of parcles

A service provider should ask customers to opt in, if they so wish, rather than tell customers that they have to tell the service provider (Royal Mail) if they want to opt out.

I’ve not missed the point at all. I simply disagree. I think they are right to do it this way, and make official what already happens anyway.

so you didn’t read the bit where they were going to tell everyone in a letter about the plan and explain how you could opt out then

Correct. I skim-read it and gave a knee jerk reaction. Apologies. Will read harder next time!

Erm, and how would the postie do that if he hasn’t got your address. Sure mine hasn’t memorised the few thousand names on his walk…

Well, obviously after putting ‘JOE BLOGGS C/O DORCHESTER SORTING OFFICE’ you would follow on with your normal address, the packages would just be filtered out when the person who stacks them into individual rounds. It wouldn’t necessarily cost money, there would less strain on the posties (especially considering almost every parcel held for collection would be a failed delivery) and assuming the sorting office had space (my local one is 50% occupied and the other 50% is completely dis-used) it would only require a second person for Saturday morning to keep up with the queue. They could even add a charge 50p per collection although at the moment the sorting offices don’t ‘do’ cash so this could be a stumbling block.

I was expecting a package the other day, so I left a note at the door, with a key for the stair cupboard. This system has worked well before, couriers seem to grasp it. Numpty Royal Mail guy shoves a card through my door, so he has to take the parcel back, and I have to collect it.

And I live downstairs from a raging psychopath, who eats nails for his dinner. Not really wanting to leave a note on my door “please don’t leave my parcels with the nutter upstairs”.

And I live downstairs from a raging psychopath, who eats nails for his dinner. Not really wanting to leave a note on my door “please don’t leave my parcels with the nutter upstairs”.

So you can choose to “opt out” then ?

If only they had a localised presence where parcels and mail that requires a signature could be collected from, some kind of office for the post. Radical I know but it might just work.

Yes I have ordered my Opt-out sticker. Lets hope it doesn’t incite nutter face to hammer on my door “do you no trust me to take your parcels then ?”.

Might be easier to move. It’s a nice neighbourhood tho apart from him.