The reason the postal service is so slow right now

[Blighty]

Lee and I were discussing the slowness of the Royal Mail at the minute and the fact that of two packages that he had sent First Class on Saturday, one had arrived on Monday morning and the other on Wednesday. Anyway had a drunken chat with a postman in my local last night and found out why this is happening. Apparently it's new rules put in by the people running the Royal Mail. There's restrictions as to how many hours a postman can work meaning certain people aren't even getting a delivery on certain days because it's not feasible. Also junk mail is prioritorized over everything else including First Class post. So if your postie has to leave some letters behind it'll be proper mail rather than some crap that's going straight in the bin.

[Lord Thames]

I just want to know what those gits have done with that copy of KPM 1060 I won on eBay two months ago that still hasn't arrived yet.........

[wooly]

i refuse to believe there are james clarke connoisseur posties out there.

[scriptfliper]

I requested my address to be removed from the Junk Mail Register about 2 years ago
http://www.mpsonline.org.uk/mpsr/mps_choosetype.html
(Mail Preference Service)
This has stopped over 90% of my Junk Mail!! Class, enviromentally friendly aswell, only takes a minute!
I tried to register a friend but he said he actually enjoyed Junk mail as it made a change from all the bills he got

[Tommo of Sprowston]

In my bit of Cardiff we've just had the ominous letter from the Royal Mail announcing that from now on service will be 'improved' by combining first and second post.

What this means in reality appears to be that 1) I never see the post before I leave for work, and so I have to go to the sorting office to collect my records and 2) my copy of the recently issued 'lost album' by Brigitte Bardot is already, well, LOST.

[Sie Vulture]

Oooh Tommo - I hope that your Kon & Amir LP turned up OK...?

BTW, apologies to all of the competition winners, all copies of the LP's had their corners dinged en route from the US... not my fault !

[Tommo of Sprowston]

No worries, Sie - the Kon and Amir turned up fine. Cheers! But then again, that was in the good old days when a postman still hit the mean streets of Canton twice before lunchtime. . .

[vinylism]

the "new, improved" postal delivery system means a delivery anywhere from 10.00am to 6.00pm (seriously).

chances are your local sorting office will also change it's opening hours without warning, which is what happened in stockport. changed from 8.00am to 7.00pm (convenient to collect things outside of working hours) to 9.00am to 5.30pm (convenient to collect things one day a week only - Saturday).

and they've also started changing the collection card from "please leave 2 hours before calling to pick up your item" to "please leave (insert random number) days before collecting your item".

gpo are rubbish. anyone fancy setting up a rival delivery service for records only?

[Nick Cope]

I'm shitting myself that the PO haven't nicked my needles or my Hell's Belles. Every morning I'm too scared to take a shit until the postie arrives, and that takes all fuckin day! Thank fuck I don't have any outside jobs on the go at the mo...

So this is a crackdown on OT I take it?

[Matt Hero]

Quote[/b] (Nick Cope @ July 17 2004,03:17)]I'm shitting myself that the PO haven't nicked my needles or my Hell's Belles. Every morning I'm too scared to take a shit until the postie arrives, and that takes all fuckin day! Thank fuck I don't have any outside jobs on the go at the mo...

So this is a crackdown on OT I take it?

I know that feeling Nick....I'm awaiting a few things at the moment too.

I believe that it is a combination of a couple of things, both a clampdown on OT, but also and attempt to reduce the overall weight that they send delivery people with every day.

It's been standard practice for the postie to be sent out with 2, 3 or 4 full bags, which they drop off somewhere and then return for at stages during the day. My local news agents is always full of bags if undelivered mail until about 3pm as the posties store it there.

There have been several stories in the local press about bags been left with these unofficial 'drop off' points for days on end, and eventually the shop or house owner having to call the PO to arrange for someone to go and pick them up again for delivery.

The rounds that they get asked to do are huge. There is no way for them to get everything delivered by say 10am, so some parts of the round don't get a delivery until 3 or 4pm. Then those householders complain, so the route gets re-organised so they get their post at 10am and the previous 10am houses get their post at 4pm. Then they complain..... and the whole routine starts again.

I get pretty pissed off with the casual way some deliveries are made, no cards through door, parcels left in front of my door in full view of the road or out in the rain for an entire weekend. I've been through the complaint proceedure 3 or 4 times and it is a waste of time.... all I got was a few free stamps and comments from the local delivery office that I was 'mistaken' and the mishandled parcels must have been delivered by Parcelforce as they'd never deliver in such a shoddy way.

I try and be fair with the postie, and understand the pressure that they are under etc, but at the end of the day we *pay* for this service and are entitled to get pissy if we don't get our money's worth.

Rant over....

[Lord Thames]

Quote[/b] (vinylism @ July 16 2004,19:16)]anyone fancy setting up a rival delivery service for records only?  

The employees would have to be rigorously vetted - it only takes one dishonest vulture to have a quick peek inside the mailer and pinch it......

Still no KPM 1060........

[Nick Cope]

What they need is bluetooth chips embedded in their postbags. So when they're approaching the house, you get a warning so you can get off the loo or call your neighbour or whatever, to make sure you can answer the door - the bluetooth warning would of course tell you if there's an oversized package for you in that bag...
This way, they would reduce all the missed deliveries and save on manpower - course they'd have to lay off hundreds to pay for this, but who cares? they nick all our stuff anyway! (kidding, in case my postie is reading this)

[wooly]

all this talk of the postal service is giving me the fear. all i've had today is junk mail.

[Nick Cope]

Haven't even had mine yet. Blighty's right, the mail has totally slowed down the last two weeks - it's a fucking joke at the moment...

[Rich Hero]

Quote[/b] (Nick Cope @ July 22 2004,12:30)]What they need is bluetooth chips embedded in their postbags.

Not such a wild idea. I guess the issue is the civil rights/privacy question...

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/06...hips_are_here/