What's going on with The Royal Mail?

Got a parcel tracked 24. Given the reference number. Put it on track n trace on RM website.

Says
An update will only be provided when we attempt to deliver your item

I need to know what time it comes as to deal with it - picking it up from sorting office etc.

At work at the moment- so got a Saturday off (yeah!)
 
We recently went through a period of getting no post delivered for over 2 weeks. Phoned up and complained to our local sorting office, and the very next day a massive bundle of delayed post was dropped through our letterbox. :rolleyes:
Since then it has been a little more regular, but definitely not every day as it should be.
 
The service that I receive from the United States Postal Service (USPS) has remained decent over the last ~10 years that I've been in the USA. I suspect that this is because it is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government, and is propped up by the taxpayer to the tune of about $5 billion per year. There was mention of the relaxation of a few deadlines related to the speed of certain mail delivery last year, but the service has remained pretty decent.
 
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Was speaking to my postie this morning, he says it's gotten really bad recently with the introduction of collections. He basically said as a postie he has far too much work to do and they are understaffed.
 
No complaints from me.
Free pick up from my door. Small and medium parcels are well priced.

I've given up with hermes/evri. There's an issue in my area with pickup. 3 times now I've had my parcel waiting to be collected for 4-7 days in the locker.
Ridiculous.

I use UPS for big stuff and RM for everything else.

UPS have been great
 
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chrismscotland said:
I have to be honest and say that Royal Mail around here remain the most reliable of any of the delivery services, seem to have constant trouble with DPD and Evri but Royal Mail come through.
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Same here. Evri are OK for delivery. But terrible for pickup. Dpd I've had a few issues with.
 
jon86 said:
The service that I receive from the United States Postal Service (USPS) has remained decent over the last ~10 years that I've been in the USA. I suspect that this is because it is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government, and is propped up by the taxpayer to the tune of about $5 billion per year. There was mention of the relaxation of a few deadlines related to the speed of certain mail delivery last year, but the service has remained pretty decent.
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IIRC it's actually quite profitable, it's just that for a long time it's been forced to basically keep enough money on the side for something like 65 years of pensions, so had to put money away for people that haven't even been born yet (IIRC minimum retirement age for USPS is something like 60).
 
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Werewolf said:
IIRC it's actually quite profitable, it's just that for a long time it's been forced to basically keep enough money on the side for something like 65 years of pensions, so had to put money away for people that haven't even been born yet (IIRC minimum retirement age for USPS is something like 60).
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Yeah.

One reason for the large losses is 2006 legislation mandating USPS pre-fund more than $120 billion in retiree healthcare and pension liabilities.
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Yeah, imagine actually having to have money set aside to pay for your retiree obligations in the future. Shock horror, the UK civil service and NHS could learn a thing or two about that...
 
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Prototype321 said:
You literally said companies are still blaming covid, I asked how can you still blame Covid? Obviously I meant the queens you not yourself personally, I have no idea who you blame.
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you asked why i still blamed covid originally. i didn't, never did. i've no idea why companies still blame covid, but they do. go ask them maybe? i've even less an idea who the queens are.
 
SpellowHouse said:
Processing is slow, deliveries are always late, pickups are even worse, they only manage to pickup about 50% of the time. I mean, the performance here is absolutely terrible. Is it just my area, or is the RM a disaster elsewhere?
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Interestingly, i have found their tracked 48 service to be really reliable. I've sold a fair few thing on ebay using it and not had an issue.

Out of the three items Ive used special delivery on recently, two of them were not delivered the next day..

So it would appear tracked 48 is far more reliable than their premier/most expensive service which is odd!
 
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IIRC it used to be that SD were handled separately to normal items and could not be delivered by temps, which if they're running into problems could mean it'll affect SD more than normal, or normal more than SD depending onwhere the problem is (IE they'd prioritise SD if it was an issue transporting items between delivery offices, but if the problem is "last mile" delivery they didn't used to have temps take out the SD items).

I think there is/was some indications that at least some delivery offices were illegally prioritising tracked items over first class in order to try and massage the stats a bit and hide issues with short staffing on the basis that you could see where the problem was with tracked/claim more compensation for it being late. I'm sure there was at least one story about how a delivery office was deliberately not doing normal items every day but making sure that tracked packages got dealt with, legally that's not allowed, as the obligation is that every effort should be made to deliver first class next working day, with penalties for it dropping under a certain level except in exceptional circumstances.
 
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Werewolf said:
IIRC the issue was that the amount was enough to fund it for people who were not born yet, let alone current employees.
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It was probably to also set aside money for future USPS employees that are expected to be hired over a set number of years.
 
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Werewolf said:
IIRC it used to be that SD were handled separately to normal items and could not be delivered by temps, which if they're running into problems could mean it'll affect SD more than normal, or normal more than SD depending onwhere the problem is (IE they'd prioritise SD if it was an issue transporting items between delivery offices, but if the problem is "last mile" delivery they didn't used to have temps take out the SD items).

I think there is/was some indications that at least some delivery offices were illegally prioritising tracked items over first class in order to try and massage the stats a bit and hide issues with short staffing on the basis that you could see where the problem was with tracked/claim more compensation for it being late. I'm sure there was at least one story about how a delivery office was deliberately not doing normal items every day but making sure that tracked packages got dealt with, legally that's not allowed, as the obligation is that every effort should be made to deliver first class next working day, with penalties for it dropping under a certain level except in exceptional circumstances.
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Interesting and that does make sense. Just seems so odd. I posted two things on a Friday (same time, same post office), one a tracked 48 costing £3.45 and one a SD costing £14.95.

The tracked 48 arrived on the following Monday, and the SD tracking didn't even update till Monday evening and got delivered Tuesday! Clearly something isn't working with how they prioritise things.
 
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Today just got my bank statement posted 21st May, car insurance renewal posted 18th May.

Luckily not very important hey.


There could be a link with Russia and commie union leaders. :p
 
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