OK, I’ll admit, despite all of the threads about how rubbish Hermes are, I still use them.

I’ve had pretty decent service from them, until recently.

Recently, my very local, at the end of the road, within walking distance hermes drop shop decided that handling parcels took their staff far too long and so dropped the service. My nearest one now is a short drive away, so it becomes a pain to get stuff there.

So, dicing with the collection service.
The delivery guy from hermes is a nice chap, at my work all the time dropping stuff off, and picking things up has never been a hassle, apart from that time he went on holiday for a few days. it didn’t get picked up until he came back. Odd I thought, but maybe a one off.

My latest parcel however was supposed to go Monday. Delivery driver came in, said he was just popping in to say he was on his holidays, but don’t worry he’s seen there’s a pick up arranged and someone else is booked to come get it.

then nothing. no pick up on monday.
Checked tracking, and they tried to pick up at 13:11, but no one was there. Of course, while the office was fully occupied, no one was there. I smell shite. But not to worry, they’ll try again the next working day.

Tuesday…nothing

Wednesday….nothing

I get in touch with hermes help, to see when it’s being picked up, or whether i can have a refund.

I wait until wednesday evening, then get fed up and sort out postage with parcelforce.

Thursday, parcelforce come collect, I check the parcelforce tracking and everything is working as it should, great.

now back to hermes…

no sign on thursday…

today, friday, I get an email saying sorry etc etc, they tried on monday, but couldn’t get the parcel, then tried wednesday (the customer service assistant says, according to the tracking), but couldn’t get here due to adverse weather.
Hold up. it was sunshine and showers on wednesday, I went for a ride in the evening and I’m a fair weather biker.
Perhaps they’d forgot their shades…

meanwhile, I log in to myhermes to check the tracking, and the adverse weather notfication to see the parcel has not only been collected, but also delivered.

I’m keen now. So have asked them to provide me with proof of delivery, as the recipient has not got the parcel….

I’ll update you as it goes…

wonder what they’ve got, or not got?

For the record, no one from hermes has been anywhere near the office since Monday.

Thye’re cheap for a reason I guess..

Everything falls over at holiday time. Our (presumably holiday cover) binmen binned our bins last week.

Hermes are only as good as their local drivers, so in my case, completely untrustworthy whether on holiday or not.

I never send anything with Hermes but get plenty of deliveries from them.

Our local guy has taken to always dropping parcels by the back door and pushing a card through the door, without knocking first. Quite often I see him driving off as the dog starts barking.

So quite reliable, but doesn’t like knocking 🤷‍♂️

I’ll add Collect+ to the absolute shower’o shite courier services. I have my own business selling stuff online, particularly personalised stuff like mugs. I arranged a delivery as the Post Office was closed – local store, always good. sent shipment details to customer. 10 days later customer contacts me to say no parcel- tracking says it was collected but never left the depot. To cut long story short, they refused my claim because I couldn’t produce a ‘receipt’ (I make them, don’t buy them) and that a mug is prohibited because it’s ceramic – it was in a crush-proof box, wrapped in bubble wrap, regardless of the fact I wasn’t asked when shipping what the parcel contained and it was lost on their premises / not damaged.

Update…
Hermes came in today looking for the parcel..over a week after the original collection was due.

This was after I recieved an email saying they couldn’t give me the signature of the recipient, as it’d not been collected and there was an error on the system.

@dovebiker, would they not accept a copy of hte transaction? hermes do if they mess up for something sold on ebay, or via paypal.

disappointed… I read the ‘m’ as a ‘p’ in the title