Anyone ever worked as a multi drop courier ( what ****** you off about this job)

West1990

West1990

West1990

Associate
Joined
1 Dec 2017
Posts
37
I Worked for an agency for 5 months , now I'm self employed , route is sorted and I'm delivering 150 parcels and making collections and hitting my deadlines and I'm tweaking it to get home earlier so my days are a lot shorter ,

But along my travels meeting a lot of people everyday, you get a grasp of peoples attitudes towards delivery drivers .

A few things that really **** me off about this job .

A) People have you tracked, that is not the issue, but ,they know you have deadlines to meet and they can see how many drops you have to make that day.

Some people will stand and talk to you for 30 minutes to an hour if you let them
( I have 2 mins dwelling time , anymore It starts delaying my delivery window , eventually closing my delivery window times tighter and tighter )

Don't get me wrong I can have a chat, but some people , take the **** They get self righteous if you cut it short because you have been left no option but to say "sorry but I have to go ,I've collections to make"

( and yea I dont want to be stressing all day trying to catch up just so we can talk about the weather )

Don't get me wrong I like talking to people , but they know I am tracked and what drop number I am on and how many I have. So why does standing talking to me for half an hour not register, they even see your cram packed van .

B)shops for collections , (not all) when you call into shops , obviously cashiers are busy , so you crack offload deliberies and scan collections, then grab a casgiers attention for a whole 20 seconds for a signature . Some people are bloody difficult ( at first, some are just always because they have control problems )

when your calling into a shop that has a post office connected to the end till which has a keypad door , the women who operates the till stands right next to the door ,she never acknowledges your there and need let in shel look right at you , if she's busy with customers she would make you wait for 10 customers before she lifts her gelatine scratcher to shoulder height and open the latch .

So you look like an aggressive dick when you ask can you let me in please

People have there little control issues , and it ****** me off, I have another 40 deliveries to make love this drop should take 3 - 4 minutes not 10 because you have parts of your job you don't like ( open a latch when delivery guys arrives )

C) people who ask for signatures on there parcels , and when you arrive they are not in , no neighbours close by , so I come back the next day, customer is in and says any other parcels to come put in outbuilding , so yea I've just spent my own money on fuel to come out here and deliver to you , because you put a signature was needed , and now you don't require one

D) people who leave safe place on there delivery option , first , ring the bell to attempt delivery , no answer ,proceed to deliver to a safe place , walk around the back , leave in shed, fill out card, lost through letterbox , proceed to van and complete delivery .. O but wait , customer pops out the door , inform customer parcel is in the shed( you didn't answer and I have more to do, than just you .)
Customer proceeds to get stroppy because they have to woddle there spoilt little arse around to there own back garden and lift a tiny parcel weighing about 500g ( people are spoiled bloody rotten and live in a fantasy , head out to Syria and get your eyes opened )

E) people(some) , treat you like some sort of scumbag , because they've had a bad experience . I've delivered your parcel early the box is in immaculate condition and I've been courteous , but yes I enjoy your **** face as much as the next **** face


People are so spoilt and self righteous it drives me nuts .

I am sociable with people and I respect genuine people who actually understand the delivery process . But at times people make me puke
 
the last thing i wanna do is talk to a delivery driver. you are there to deliver and that is it.

point D that is just hilarious as in how many people would actually do that?

point C is valid though. i'd wish every company had your safe place on their books so i no longer need to visit depots, etc.

also as a customer. the number of parcels i've had damaged, stuff missing, etc you wouldn't believe. yodel is the worst of the worst. DPD i have found to be the best. i've only had 1 issue in about 10 years and that was resolved by a phone call.
 
Point C - I'm not sure if you have ever ordered anything, but as the customer placing the order, you generally do not get asked if you want it to be delivered with a signature, that's stipulated by the sender.
 
Lopéz said:
Point C - I'm not sure if you have ever ordered anything, but as the customer placing the order, you generally do not get asked if you want it to be delivered with a signature, that's stipulated by the sender.
Click to expand...

Yeah was going to comment on that - while in some cases you can ask for it or the customer will have asked for it - in a lot of cases it is either the default option for certain types of items with the option buried away if people even have control over it so might not have noticed and/or some stuff the customer will have no choice over whether a signature is required.

Sadly in customer facing roles you quickly realise the larger number of people really do have something a bit wrong with them :( and can't just live and let live, etc. or have proper consideration for others but then sometimes there is the other side of the story where someone has a good reason to be frustrated that might not be obvious.
 
Lopéz said:
Point C - I'm not sure if you have ever ordered anything, but as the customer placing the order, you generally do not get asked if you want it to be delivered with a signature, that's stipulated by the sender.
Click to expand...

This is true, Amazon stipulate a signature for alcohol and won't deliver it to a locker which is a right pain in the arse.
 
Energize said:
This is true, Amazon stipulate a signature for alcohol and won't deliver it to a locker which is a right pain in the arse.
Click to expand...

I have a strong suspicion that amazon are not the only ones that have additional conditions for alcohol.

If you blind deliver alcohol you're open to being done for selling to minors.
 
Having been a delivery driver myself for almost a decade in one form or another I can say one thing is for sure.

People have absolutely no idea what it is actually like to be a delivery driver. It's not even remotely close to what they think it is. It most certainly is not a nice little drive and easy to do. You literally need eyes in the back of your head to avoid the numerous idiots on the roads that should not be driving!

Oh and one more thing, named properties, are an absolute ball ache.
 
MadMossy said:
Having been a delivery driver myself for almost a decade in one form or another I can say one thing is for sure.

People have absolutely no idea what it is actually like to be a delivery driver. It's not even remotely close to what they think it is. It most certainly is not a nice little drive and easy to do. You literally need eyes in the back of your head to avoid the numerous idiots on the roads that should not be driving!

Oh and one more thing, named properties, are an absolute ball ache.
Click to expand...

This X 100%, I never did multi-drop as a regular thing, but I did some agency work when I was ‘between jobs’ and occasionally it would entail multi-drop, more aggravation than it was worth.
Trying to find somewhere to park, stroppy customers who’d expect you to carry 4 or 5 40lb cartons up flights of stairs, people who’d insist that their delivery had been scheduled for yesterday, and weren’t interested to hear that you’d reported for work that morning, and the depot manager had pointed to a truck, and said, “Take that one, and deliver in the order that the delivery notes are, on the clip board.”
I hear you loud and clear on the named properties, I did a winter seasonal job for a big oil company, delivering central heating oils to houses in the Home Counties.
You’d be faced with seeking “The Larches”, on a three or four mile long country road, with houses set back from the road, with long drives, and little finger posts, saying “The Larches” hidden in overgrown bushes and trees, and this job was an evening shift, 16.00 - midnight, you had difficulty seeing the road, let alone little house signs.
 
I worked in yodel for a few months for a separate business. One of the worst organised companies I've ever seen. I went into work and saw dpd and all the rest of them out on the road already. Meanwhile the lorry bringing in our stuff to deliver was sometimes finished unloading at 11am. When you have pre 12 deadlines to meet and are 25 minutes away from any of your deliveries it's pretty dumb.
I also had a hospital in my area that would only take parcels to the specific ward they were going to. So if I had 3 deliveries for completely different bits of the hospital I could often waste an hour walking around when I have over 100 deliveries in the van.
Everything about it was just irritating and I really didn't enjoy it. Might seem great to have no boss with you in the van but I was getting called by the guy who owned the company working for yodel every 30 minutes or so. Don't miss it a bit!
 
Delivery guy's side:
A-Pretend that you don't speak English or has a sore throat so you cannot speak.
B-Try to smile and say something positive to the cashier, probably next time they will be quicker to open the door for you.
C-Usually is the sender that asks for a signature.
D-Well you could always use number 1, point back or just walk out.
E-that is people for you, that is why I hate 99% or more of them.

People's side:
A-some people just like to talk, try to be nice to you or they are the exactly the opposite you were complaining in E
B-Well people were there before you to be served, so in reality they have the priority and I doubt they make you wait more than 2 minutes.
C-sender blablabla
D-Delivery guys knock the door, wait 5s or less before leaving, sometimes I was 2s away from the door, opened it my parcel was at my door and the delivery guy was gone already.
E-some delivery guys are not nice as well, many times I look out of my window and see them throwing parcels not bothering if they will break something or not.

My side:
I usually only say thank you, I only talk to one delivery guy because he always talks to me, but no more than a few words
Some delivery guys deliver to the wrong address and that happens quite often, they can't be bother to check if the address is right.
Some delivery guys knock the door and don't wait, they drop your parcel by the door (even if you are not in) or move to your neighbor (I don't take more than 10s to get to my door)
 
I worked as a delivery driver approx 13 years ago and honestly was one of my favourite pre "career" jobs. Was in the time before sat navs and you had to plan your routes with a map and paper but getting to drive around rural Devon and Cornwall all day really wasn't all that bad! Met some nice and some less nice people but no 2 weeks were ever the same.
 
There's a guy who works for one of the big couriers who comes into our office, hangs around for ages, makes loads of annoying, over familiar and distracting banter with other staff then leaves sometimes 10 minutes later.

I don't engage but I always wonder how he has time for this.
 
Having done multi drop ranging from 100+ drops over a small area to 20+ over a huge area (national) in everything from Fiesta Vans through to 44t articulated trucks over the years I think it’s safe to say the OP isn’t cut out for this kind of work! :p

A few pointers....

Keep pleasantries to a bare minimum.

Accept customers won’t drop everything as soon as you rock up for a collection.

Being berated / viewed as dirt for turning up with an item they’ve ordered is par for the course.

Other road users view you as almost as big of a ***** as they really are.

Everyone else is just trying to get on with their day and has their own crap to deal with.

And think yourself lucky you haven’t got to worry about driving hours restrictions, weight limits, height limits or wondering if your vehicle will even get into or out of your delivery point. :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom