Mrchu_ said:
OMG are these guys still using city link,they are rubbish for cities
They are better than many of the others, believe me I work for one of the other complanies, I have acquaintance with many other couriers. Nationally the City Link averages are better than most other companies who employ owner drivers (I'm an owner driver).
On a given day I see at least 2 City Link drivers covering a round I cover on my own, they have less work and stress. They have also just moved back in house, so no more franchises. You may have worse results for a given area, but OCUK use them for a reason, they're the best of a bad bunch, remember they have to look at their averages, there will always be failures. Most of this is due to the lack of goverment legislation regarding multi drop couriers. I see most people slagging couriers off, many times it's justified, but if they only knew what a days work actually involves..
Although it's not posiible for every firm, epecially the larger ones, many of my smaller customers now use Couriers firms based on their service to a known location, it takes many years of sending freight to discover who's best in a district. Some customers will have accounts for three seperate firms, using the best for each area.
You can't apply this to OCUK, shipping rates and discounts are applied according to volume of shipments, they have a deal and pricing structure in place. ATM from what I know through placing my own orders, they have a set rate which covers orders over 10kg too. Although the £8 seems high for smaller parcels, it saves cost for heavier orders.
You also have to take into account that certain dispatch times are not always available with every firm. I can make some of my collections at 1.30pm, some of my customers want them @ 4.30 pm, you can't have a driver everywhere at once.
Using other firms would probably require more staff at the dispatch end, so that would mean at least another £15,000 average per annum for one new member of staff.
Raja
I have posted this in the genral forum too, just for people to try to understand what goes on behind the scenes.
BTW Most courier firms should reimburse for failed deliveries, OCUK should be able to get shipping costs back for deliveries that have not been made on time without good reason.
am sure a few points come from my OC'd 3800+ 
