Post Office Deliveries

Are any readers experiencing significant delays with their daily Post Office deliveries? My daily deliveries have been somewhat erratic, sometimes three or four days without the postman doing his round in our close, last Saturday we received our daily post at 7 o’clock in the evening after a period of three days without deliveries. When we get post there is at least a couple of days worth in each delivery, yesterday I received 5 packages and letters, some of the packages I had expected over a week ago. Rumours circulating via social media is that the Post Office deliveries are undergoing a dramatic reorganisation in order to reduce staff, the majority view is that it isn’t working. If this is true then it looks like the Post Office is breaking its agreement to provide a daily delivery to all customers, is this progress? Would like to hear comments from readers in other areas of the country on their experiences, my local area is he South Coast just outside Eastbourne.

No problems in the Crewe Cheshire area. I believe that they have just had a massive new sorting warehouse built near Northampton and are doing a lot of re-organisation.

Dek.

I do know that they are very short staffed in some areas, so perhaps that's the reason you seem to be getting delayed deliveries. Talk to your postman, if you can, and you'll probably be told the same as I was.

G.

My wife's birthday was early September and my sisters posted her cards on the 24th August they arrives on the 8th September.

Even though they were letters I can understand why people that send small parcels by them are now resorting to other delivery options. I know that during the Covid lockdown it was difficult but I am sure that with the lifting of restrictions they should be getting somewhere near to normal services

No problem with daily deliveries here (I think - although they may not send out the postie with all the post for the round every day, mind).

However I have noticed the posties are tending to be prettier than in the past (all the ladies are prettier than the fellas, IMO!).

Delivery times do seem to be quite variable. Mostly plus/minus midday, but often much earlier or later (as late as 16:30, at least).

Possibly posties are not starting as early as they used to, finishing their round and going home, so maybe have a wider range of shorter rounds? Also, the posties themselves tend to (be) change(d) more often.

Certainly nothing definite to complain about, for me. I expect the rural (motorised) rounds are definitely unchanged - as the postie on one round, that I see fairly regularly, always arrives around the middle of the afternoon.

Curiously, here in Zummerset, the postal service mostly improved during the worst of the Covid crisis in that deliveries arrived at 10am rather than lunchtime, and sometimes on Sunday too! Pure luck. My sister in nearby South Gloucester suffers frequent delays. She knows a postman well: he says the difference is mostly caused by the sorting office: my postal area has a spacious modern facility, hers is old-fashioned, due to be modernised, and the cramped together staff have all been ill.

I don't know how the Post Office are dealing with staff shortages due to Covid, which is still causing considerable trouble. I imagine they recruited lots of temporaries who will be laid off as the situation improves. This laying off may be the source of Social Media comment, though I'm sure the PO (as a private company) is always actively seeking to improve efficiency, and not necessarily in customer friendly ways.

Also in the news is the shortage of HGV Drivers caused by leaving the EU. There are about 600,000 jobs and 100,000 vacancies are causing noticeable delivery delays in some areas. Round here, Builders Merchants seem to be worst effected, plus a few gaps on supermarket shelves, but otherwise no obvious effect on my post, Amazon or other deliveries.

I suspect the impact on deliveries due to COVID and staff shortages depends on where you live.

Dave

Perhaps the problem lies in staff recruitment, we are after all in the affluent South East and wages have always been a bone of contention with some businesses able to outwage National rates such as Royal Mail etc. so other employments are more attractive, more research needed to find the source of the deliveries problem. Dave W

We have not had any problems/delays with deliveries of letters and parcels in the Reading area of Berkshire. I have never had problems with small/medium parcels on their 48hr tracked service which I think is excellent value for money, now they will collect from your door for a small fee. For large/small letters and small/medium parcels I wouldn't consider going anywhere else. That said the local DO is close and convenient.

MartinW

I too noticed really fast deliveries last year, Not been testing it recently. However out rural postie of decades was moved against his will recently and the replacement apparently did her last day on Tuesday. With Steve he knew where to delver stuff just addressed to the Cricket Club, knew my house when the house nameplate was not up (for about 15 years), would give you your post if he met you walking at the bottom of the hill, didn't mind my overgrown path and would let out errant sheep in the garden if necessary.
How long before we have to have car accessible postboxes like the Americans, or a trip to a box in town.

The local postal service was very erratic after Christmas and is now down to around three deliveries a week. It is acknowledged that the main sorting office for my area, at Filton, Bristol, has had difficultues with COVID-19.

However their tracking system, unlike Parceforce, works and I had no difficulty in delaying the delivery of a small parcel last week.

I accept the problems and and am happy with their operation. I do avoid the local main post office, which is always busy, and send small packages etc from a small village shop/post office about five miles away.

JA

I have no problem with my post, but then, I keep my postman well supplied with apple tarts !

Seems to help.

Just an idea !

Actually, I cannot find fault with my local Post Office, they are helpful to a fault.

Credit where credit is due.

Our regular postie has been on holiday so we've been having deliveries every other day. Spoke to our ex local postie as he was doing the round as overtime and told it was staff shortages through holidays, sickness, covid etc That day there were 20 rounds short of posties and wasn't expecting it to improve much in the forseeable future.

All seems fine here in South Dorset, but I would expect the sort of problems others report to be fairly local.

Certainly a manual I ordered from Tony Griffiths arrived today only 3 or 4 days after I ordered it - I think he copies them to order so I would expect a little waiting.

We live in a village and apart from a short time where we were getting mail at 19:00 for a few weeks because of sickness, the lady postwoman was doing two rounds to cover, we have had normal deliveries, parcels come around 08:00 and mail comes at 11:00 - 12:00 every day.

Martin P

Here in the West Midlands, our delivery can be anytime between 08:30 to 15:30, no logical pattern.

Just wait for the dog to start grizzling and know he / she is on the way. How does she know? You can't see the bottom of the road from the front of our house and the postie is hardly noisy, but the dog is always correct as 3 - 4 minutes later he / she appears walking up the hill the other side of the road. Amazing.

But But But you have a right to instant gratification, the great god Amazon Prime says so, if not the next day, at times hours after ordered. I just expect things to ARRIVE. Sent some ME items to a mate in the Phillipines six years ago. Still not arrived and he died two years ago.

Regards Ian.

Postie delivered yesterday at ten past seven in the evening so I chatted to him why were the deliveries so erratic in our area and he said that they have serious staff shortages so the Post Office expects the posties who are at work to step up and do another round after they have finished their normal rounds, predictably not all are up for two rounds a day. He says that the local postal services in our area are in chaos, drastically short of posties and managers, he is a really laid back guy and is quite happy for the extra overtime, I feel sorry for him though as just lately have been ordering quite a lot of materials for my modelling which all get delivered by the postie, yesterday he delivered three lengths of 5/8” bronze rod, no mean weight that he had to lug around till he got to our house. Hoping that our local postal problems get resolved soon but that’s maybe wishful thinking. Dave W

You were lucky to get it delivered, I have seen the card come through the letterbox saying I wasn’t in and to collect from the post office.

Mike

At least if they are ‘up-front’ with the problems, you know how you stand for deliveries. It is the lying that gets people’s backs up. Especially if you know you were in!