Postie hoards over 30,000 letters


And we wonder where things go

TT

It happens, not as often as it is made out though. It is getting worse as there are a lot more part time and agency temps working now who don't really care where the mail goes. The management are just as bad. A large number of managers in this area were suspended for holding back mail and sending it out in vans when an audit was due so that the office complied with the clear office policy. Only one was sacked because he was found to have been nicking money.

Two of us spent three weeks tagging, bagging and inserting an apology letter into 60,000 items that a part timer had failed to deliver over the Christmas period. We, and the six posties who had to deliver it on the routes which he covered along with the normal mail, weren't particularly happy about that. His excuse was he didn't have time to deliver it as he had to pick his child up from nursery He got let off with a caution.

They say the mail is less now. The stamped mail is, the ones with paid for stamps, the pre-paid and non stamped mail, junk mail mostly, has increased and the delivery times have gone up since they made it one delivery. They have also increased the number of delivery points to such an extent that it is near impossible to deliver all the mail in the time allocated. Complain and there is a witch hunt against the complainer 'till they find a way to sack him. That is from experience they tried it with me and a mate of mine but couldn't find anything. He became a trainer with the post office and I got new starts to train after that

To give you an idea of the job. On the run up to Christmas, especially the last couple of weeks, I could be delivering anything up to six bags with a total weight of 106 Kilos, no van and no bike. The bags were dropped of by the drivers at what was laughingly called second bag boxes or they met you somewhere on your delivery. I had 410 delivery points, flats, terraced houses and bungalows with long drives. Doesn't sound much but a normal day took nearly three hours to deliver, I still only had that time with the six bags. If I couldn't deliver a packet I had that to carry all the way round too. I'm not standing up for the new Royal Mail as I too think it is **** but it isn't all down to the posties.

I'm just glad I retired when I did

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Sandy
Carried it in full, then carry it out empty.

Hell of a read!

Posted over a couple of fly rods to one of the Forum members (all past experiences have taken 7 - 10 work days 'hand to hand') .... and zip, nada, ok where the hell is the damned thing, etc.

Confirmed by today's PM's that it there.

fae

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living are now outnumbered by those who vote for a living." -- Anonymous

I know there are some genuine posties working hard, but it seems the delivery times get longer and longer. At one time if you posted an item first class on Monday the recipient would get it Tuesday morning. Not any more-recently had an item take three days from Manchester to Lonbdon. Don,t know why that happened, but that is NOT first class service!!!

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The delivery postman has no control over that, that is why it annoys me when they get blamed. If he has miss-delivered it then he deserves the criticism. You get used to people shouting at you in the street, threatening you or leaving the dog out when they know you are about to get to their door Always remember though that the postman has your life in his bag, p11ss him of and it might go to Glasgow instead of London

An example, Every time I delivered a letter to a new tenant in a high rise flat he would come out screaming and swearing that the person didn't live there. This went on for about two weeks. His benefits cheque came in. I showed it to my manager and told him that I was sending it back to the DHSS as this was the same person that I had informed him about. He said OK and I marked it 'not known at this address' and put it in the dead letter box. I passed the door and when I got to the bottom of the flats the person in question was waiting. As nice as ninepence he asked if I had anything for him. I asked for the name and address. He gave the name that he had been denying lived at that address and I told him that I had sent the letter back. It took him six weeks to get his money. Not a nice thing to do granted, but I had done nothing wrong as I couldn't take the chance with a benefit cheque going to the wrong person even though I was sure it was his.

It is mostly machines that do all the sorting now. I don't know how good the software is now but we used to get loads of letters for Manchester because of the post code. The OCR would see M11 as ML1 or M15 as ML5

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Don't worry, be happy.
Sandy
Carried it in full, then carry it out empty.

Have sympathy for the postmen as they do a great job but the company is now being run very poorly, with postmen being stopped from leaving the depot once the post is sorted as they used to and now have to wait til a specified time. Junk mail forces them to carry ever heavier bags and I have heard that they are going to stop them using their cars to get about and get taken to their round and picked up in a van. This is to stop them running around and finishing early. So instead they can wait in the freezing rain to be picked up (probably late).

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Location - Ospreylia

I think the service is actually pretty good. I post all my fly orders first class and 95% of them arrive the next day - even from here in the South East to places up in Scotland. Not bad in my eyes.

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Casting At Shadows - Christmas Island Fly Fishing DVD

I got next doors Mail a few days ago, Not a problem so opened the door and the post woman was just accross the street so pointed out the mistake and walked down next doors drive, as I walked back I got a torrent of abuse from posty bint about how its not her fault her I Phone gives the wrong Number for my house, I pointed to the mahusive big Number in the middle of the front door shook my head and went back in

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Allan
Only dead fish go with the flow.

That has always been the case unless you had business insurance but you weren't covered for mail in the car. It was only valid from the depot to the start of the run and then back again. If you left mail in the car and it was stolen you weren't covered. Having the car doesn't make the run faster just easier as you didn't have to wait on the van to drop you off and pick you up again and you could drop your own extra bags off at the boxes and drop off points so that you knew they would be there when you got to that point. Postmen who use their car to do the run aren't insured and neither is their car if they have an accident. It doesn't pay to rush round and finish early because when they catch you doing it the management then add extra delivery points or extra duties. There is an average time calculated for each letter drop, an average walking pace and an average for the number of delivery points you visit each day. They base the time taken for each run on that basis so any postman going faster than that isn't doing himself or his mates any favours.

__________________
Don't worry, be happy.
Sandy
Carried it in full, then carry it out empty.

There will always be problems in delivering mail, but I think overall, Royal Mail service is fantastic value for money. I send out many small packages and parcels each week across Europe and, touch wood, I can count on the fingers of one hand any problems I've had over the last 5 years or so and even then I can only recall maybe two items going missing. With the minority of problems you hear about, I'm willing to bet a lot of the problems are caused by the senders, through bad labelling and/or packaging.

If you consider the current cost of posting a letter by first class post in the UK at £0.46, what a service that is, where all you have to do is pop your letter into a post box and it ends up being hand delivered to the address of your choice.

If it wasn't for the fact that Royal Mail has created such a huge customer base over many decades and invested millions in equipment and technology, their services could never be available at the prices on offer.