Courier or postie ?

[pragmatist]

We've been in business a very long time (so long don't ask ) but have only recently started shipping hardware. A parcel sent via what was supposed to be 2-3 day courier to mainland Europe was despatched before Christmas and, after much hassle, has supposedly just arrived - their tracking is showing it as having no activity since Thursday morning but I have just received an email saying it was delivered and signed for on the 2nd. I shan't say how many phone calls, emails and online forms have been involved. Just say I'm significantly balder than I was.

Having hated couriers all my life and having a wonderful set of postmen I am beginning to wonder if people would prefer recorded or registered post to a courier. Needs to be signed for but what we want is quick and reliable. Does anyone have views or suggestions ?

Penny

 

[Richard10002]

I don't know about Europe but, on the occasions I need to send a parcel, Royal Mail are generally competitive price wise, and things get there fine.

 

[Sticky Fingers]

Trouble is that RM lose sight of them at the country boundary when they hand off to the next national PO. We use DHL which has been completely OK, it's not especially cheap but costs might be OK depending on the value of the thing you're sending. Much more expensive if you don't have an account.

 

[vyv_cox]

I mostly use DHL via Interparcel to send stuff to Greece. Following the tracking suggests that most parcels arrive in Greece quite promptly but then stand for a while, mainly because transport to the islands is intermittent. Nothing has ever got lost but sometimes takes longer than anticipated.

 

[PlanB]

After a couple of bad experiences, I would never use normal post to Spain. I always ask for courier, and have never had a problem.

 

[Robert Wilson]

I've had good and bad experiences with both RM and couriers.
Royal Mail send "problem parcels" to a depot in Belfast where they seem to disappear into a hole; sometimes to re-emerge after a long time - sometimes never.
Couriers seem to be slightly more reliable in tracking "problem parcels"

On balance, I would rely on Royal Mail ever so slightly more than couriers - but I don't send a lot of parcels over a twelve month period.

 

[Yngmar]

Ordered stuff by DHL and DPD from Germany and Italy - pricey, but consistently good. Would recommend.

UPS consistently bad, every single time this nonsense happens: "The company or receiver name is incorrect. This will delay delivery. We're attempting to update this information." Apparently they can't find a marina with 1600 berths. Easy to miss, or perhaps the driver didn't know they usually put them by the water. You then have to ring them and explain it, at which point the parcel gets redirected to their "parcel shop" (a nearby off-license). All with major delays and annoyances - horrible. If you don't follow the tracking and inquire about the nonsensical message within a few days, they return the parcel. Avoid.

Imported from the US via FedEx, which worked ok and they do the duty handling, but charge a hefty fee for it and you must collect at the depot (which is typically in an industrial estate somewhere far out of town).

RM is good in the UK only - send internationally and they use whatever local carrier they have a contract with - so depends on route and destination country. Parcel to Portugal arrived smashed up, luckily it was sent insured. Submitted photos and filled out form - half a year later refund was issued.

Note that in many cases the tracking data often isn't forwarded and when the carriers change, you may or may not receive a new tracking number as the last item, which you must then look up in the new couriers tracking system. If you don't notice this, it'll look like the tracking has ceased to update and the parcel no longer moves, when in reality it still does, but in a different tracking system.

 

[sailaboutvic]

Here a Christmas story , a Parcel was sent just be fore Christmas from Suffolk to Birmingham by RM to be sign for at the other end , after nearly two week a card had arrived saying it at the mail PO but can't be delivered because a fee needed to be paid , when we picked it up the parcel had no stamps just the RM bar code sticker , now we know it's been paid for as we have a copy of the received , but they insisted because there no stamp we had to pay again .
What seen to had happen is although the fee was paid the PO didn't put any stamp on it and as far as our end where concerned it hasn't been paid for .
. In the end we just paid the fee and didn't bother to take it any further , it wasn't worth the hassle .

 

[Davy_S]

Regarding Greece, you need to check very carefully who exactly will deliver parcels, certainly in the islands. In the past this has caused some to refuse to send to Greece or impose a huge delivery charge. We had helm seats delivered once, (or failed to deliver) when we enquired, they had been delivered and signed for! it was only when we threatened the Greek company with legal action that lo and behold, they turned up. they had been sat on the order for four weeks! the same scenario happened with wifi boosters and a log burner, all companies sent their orders on time, the Greek couriers failed to deliver. A friend uses fed ex for his ebay dealings and has no problems at all, also, if it goes through the Greek postal service, it has been faultless.

 

[charles_reed]

Ordered stuff by DHL and DPD from Germany and Italy - pricey, but consistently good. Would recommend.

UPS consistently bad, every single time this nonsense happens: "The company or receiver name is incorrect. This will delay delivery. We're attempting to update this information." Apparently they can't find a marina with 1600 berths. Easy to miss, or perhaps the driver didn't know they usually put them by the water. You then have to ring them and explain it, at which point the parcel gets redirected to their "parcel shop" (a nearby off-license). All with major delays and annoyances - horrible. If you don't follow the tracking and inquire about the nonsensical message within a few days, they return the parcel. Avoid.

Imported from the US via FedEx, which worked ok and they do the duty handling, but charge a hefty fee for it and you must collect at the depot (which is typically in an industrial estate somewhere far out of town).

RM is good in the UK only - send internationally and they use whatever local carrier they have a contract with - so depends on route and destination country. Parcel to Portugal arrived smashed up, luckily it was sent insured. Submitted photos and filled out form - half a year later refund was issued.

Note that in many cases the tracking data often isn't forwarded and when the carriers change, you may or may not receive a new tracking number as the last item, which you must then look up in the new couriers tracking system. If you don't notice this, it'll look like the tracking has ceased to update and the parcel no longer moves, when in reality it still does, but in a different tracking system.

Precisely my experience, with DHL, I was on the receiving end. When finally we sorted out the delivery, it took 2 days to reach Athens and two weeks to get from Athens to Sigri (actually I collected).
I don't think all couriers are the same (from experience @ receiving end), some are worse - but Royal Mail have some funny quirks - anything that might be construed a weapon is forbidden on international deliveries.

 

[Tony Cross]

Further to sending stuff to Greece via courier, always get the sender to write your phone number in big letters on the outside of the package. That way, if there is any confusion with your address - often a Greek address written in English can be a problem to decipher for some - they know who to call. Otherwise the package just sits around until somebody comes to claim it or it gets sent back.

Also, never have stuff from outside the EU sent to you in Greece via courier. The Greek courier company will hold on to your package and charge you VAT, import duties, and a whacking great handling fee - especially if it's a high value item. If you can get these things sent via the postal service, the Greek postal service doesn't (usually) try to make money in this way....

 

[Neil_Y]

Another vote for Interparcel, they've been quite good at chasing when things go wrong, but I use TNT for all imports from Oz and mostly UPS (through interparcel) for export to Europe on a next day or 3 day delivery. It sometimes goes wrong but it also goes wrong between Plymouth and Poole with TNT in a quite expensive fashion when they damage boxes and loose items on the floor of the depot. After visiting all the depots on the route I found some items with local managers, their customer services were not that much help.

 

[jdc]

My experience is as a receiver of parcels in foreign marinas or yacht clubs, in Brazil and in French Guyana.

FedEx brilliant. Arrives when they say, and has an excellent on-line chat with helpful staff. Electric motor to Brazil, Sail materals to Guyana. They handled all customs without trouble. 9/10 for service (not 10/10 as one can't pay import duty to them by paypal).

DHL arrived ok, but the parcel being sent to French Guyana from Amsterdam went first to Quebec, then to nowhereville in the US, then to Leipzig, then to Paris and only then to French Guyana. It took at least twice as long as promised but did arrive. Big fuss about customs as they won't clear it unless you have a handling agent and we had to make multiple telephone calls and pay an agent (generator spare part). 6/10.

Postal service to Brazil arrived in less than 10 days, no problems at all. And no duty to pay either. (Giant pot of Marmite, so I'm not sure how the Brazilains would have calculated tax anyway!) 10/10.

TNT: the acronym is Totally Not Trustworthy. Failed to deliver to Brazil. Their trackig site is updated only every few days and so can't be trusted. Their help email takes >24 hours to respond, and the response was 'my colleagues in another department deal with your kind of query'. So another >24 hours to get response from that person. Eventually delivery promised. Less than 24hrs to go to their now promised date, having checked out of the country, the web site updated to show another 72 hours delay. So we left. and in fact the parcel never arrived and so is just lost somewhere. I complained to their on-line help: 4 month later still no response, not even an acknowledgement that I have made contact. Maybe in Holland they're ok? 0/10: will never use again and I specify to any supplier not to use them.