Don’t Shoot the Courier

[Chienmortbb]

Which courier have you had more grief from? For me it’s DHL tracking nonexistent, top of the page says we haven’t got your parcel yet, bottom says it was collected yesterday. This is not the first time I have had problems with DHL.

 

Hermes have always been good (well maybe delayed once), Royal Mail consistently good. UPS a farce at times. 
 

I would be interested in the experience of others. 
 

One final thought 9 out of 10 men look silly in shorts, why do even Royal Mail Post People wear them?

Edited April 20, 2022 by Chienmortbb

[T-Bay]

Royal Mail are brilliant around here, DHL are fine, no problems (tracking is pants though). Herpes are either fine or mindblowingly bad so it’s pot luck. The worst are Yodel and the now defunct Initial city Link. I would not use any company that used them as I knew it would be a nightmare.

[Graham]

In all honesty, I think most couriers are much the same and positive or negative experiences have more to do with your local depot for that courier than the overall quality of individual couriers.

 

For example, at work we refuse point blank to deal with UPS if we can possibly avoid it, but I know in other parts of the country they're fine.

[gazhowe]

I’ve found DPD to be pretty good so far, particularly for up to date tracking info. 

[MacDaddy]

DPD's tracking has twice shown my package has been signed for and left with my neighbours Shirley or Karen.

Both times the package was in front of my door.

Also I do not have any neighbours called Shirley or Karen.

 

[Maude]

Bare legs don't soak up puddles in the rain. 

 

[jezzaboy]

I think that they all have their good days and bad, even Hermes or whatever they are called are good sometimes. I sent quite a few basses with APC with a shipper and never had any probs but I don`t think they move any parcels the size of guitars any more.

 

And re the shorts. I deliver to building sites wearing shorts from April to about October of the year as do some of my fellow drivers and we are cool as feck!! 

[Chienmortbb]

53 minutes ago, jezzaboy said:

I think that they all have their good days and bad, even Hermes or whatever they are called are good sometimes. I sent quite a few basses with APC with a shipper and never had any probs but I don`t think they move any parcels the size of guitars any more.

 

And re the shorts. I deliver to building sites wearing shorts from April to about October of the year as do some of my fellow drivers and we are cool as feck!! 

When I were a lad we wanted out of short trousers as soon as we could. Don’t get me started about those Tats. 

[Downunderwonder]

'Walk shorts' were the fashion here in the 70's into the 80's. Tailored shorts almost to the knees, accompanied by football length calf covering dress 'walk socks', and dress shoes. Go figure.

[ubit]

11 hours ago, Graham said:

In all honesty, I think most couriers are much the same and positive or negative experiences have more to do with your local depot for that courier than the overall quality of individual couriers.

 

Yup, this is the definite case up here. No matter who I want to use Menzies are going to be the first port of call, so if a parcel is going down South they take it to Glasgow and from then I have no idea who takes over, Coming the other way no matter who takes the parcel to Glasgow, it's Menzies who take it to me.

[BassAdder60]

DPD 👍

[Aidan63]

All of them are fine with the 99.999% of parcels that just get collected, trunked and delivered, and all of them are bad at handling the 0.001% where it doesn't go according to plan, but UPS are now the biggest bunch of lying, useless, impossible to contact and culturally f'd up of the lot in my experience, whereas 3 years ag they were the most easily contacted and helpful who worked to resolve issues and took ownership, but not anymore, humans replaced by AI and mechanical handling.

DHL seem to be the best on imports sorting the duty etc..fairly efficiently, but they, like most of them, want you to do their reconciliation work for them. DPD are great shipping into Ireland and the paperwork works on parcel2go, but into other countries it doesn't so I end up using UPS into France and Holland and crossing everything in case it goes tits up. Fedex are slow on import paperwork, UPS are awful a lot of the time, stuff sitting around LondonHub or EastMidlands for days and days, just being bounced onto the next shift constantly, and even when you've paid the duty it takes a few shifts for it to get trunked to depot for final delivery, gone are the days when they cleared and processed the inbound each day everyday.

All our local drivers are great, most have worked the area for years fortunately and despite lack of support from the staff at the depots and ridiculous workloads and mileage they do a fantastic job in a huge rural area many miles from the depots

The investment made in IT by Hermes has had a positive outcome, I'm guessing Amazon provided a lot of that behind the scenes.

YMMV

Edited April 21, 2022 by Aidan63
spelling

[Thunderbird]

Dpd are really good and my hermes guy is pretty reliable also 

Royal mail has always been good for me 

The headache couriers for me are Yodel they are the biggest pile of stinky brown stuff ever 

DHL tracking is useless as is trying to phone them 

 

[tauzero]

Hermes have got better here. DPD have also improved since my horrendous experience with them a few years ago, when it seemed they'd lost a Warwick Thumb 5. My local Parcelfarce delivery man ("we can lose an elephant and break an anvil") is good - a guitar rack arrived yesterday in an inner box packed in an outer box, which was damaged (not the inner box though), and he took a photo of it in case I needed to make a claim.

 

I've used UPS in the past without problems, and they do good insurance cover. It appears they may have deteriorated since then.

[NikNik]

I think, post-covid, they're all the same, though DPD seem to be the better of a loose bunch. 

 

Never had to deal with DHL until that nightmare back in February where they simply failed to deliver on first date and on the following three dates ignored re-delivery addresses. Plus, box had what clearly looked like a steel toe-capped boot had made contact with it at force. I was actually praying for damage over that one, just so they could take the hit!

[nekomatic]

On 20/04/2022 at 19:10, MacDaddy said:

DPD's tracking has twice shown my package has been signed for and left with my neighbours Shirley or Karen.

Both times the package was in front of my door.

Also I do not have any neighbours called Shirley or Karen.

 

Knock Knock

- Who’s there

Shirley or Karen

- Shirley or Karen who

Shirley or Karen expect me to pass up this obvious setup for a joke

[NikNik]

One thing I'm not happy about, and couriers are using this as proof of delivery, is packages being left outside your door and someone other than a member of your household signing for it. Next time that happens when I purchase another guitar, there's going to be a bit of bother.

[Boodang]

Never had any problems with royal mail/parcel force, the complete opposite with Hermes which presumably accounts for their current re-branding exercise!

[Bassfinger]

When I discover that a parcel is being sent via Herpes I am filled with dread. Changing their name has done nothing to improve their service, and everyone has already twigged who Evri really are, so that seems like an expensive exercise in futility.

 

Royal Mail are pretty good with small pacels, and my lady postie has nice legs and very obligingly jogs up the lane to my house. She takes care of my parcels, and she gets a bottle of wine every crimbo as a thank you.