Australia Post

[Calliope]

Mine is even better.

Even if I am at home, they just by default put a card in the mailbox.

( and I live in a standard residential area)

Yes. I was expecting this package and I happened to be looking out when the postman popped this card in my box. I had to chase him down the street to get this small package.

They should bring back the whistle.

 

[Smurf1976]

Remember, the sender is paying to have it delivered to your door, so an overburdened postman is no excuse.

Indeed.

What I really don't understand is why registered mail gets sent to one post office about 4km from where I live, whilst parcels end up at another about 2km away. You would think they would at least all go to the same one. On one occasion I ended up going to both in the same day to pick up different items.

My real mail problems aren't with Australia Post however. They are with the snails that keep going inside the letterbox whenever it rains (like today...) and eating the mail. I recently had a 50 page document delivered, and there was a hole eaten straight through all 50 pages. They've also eaten a water bill and, more importantly, a cheque in recent times.

I'm generally not keen on poisoning anything since all the various creatures fit into the ecosystem somehow, but it's time for these snails to go...

 

[Julia]

Remember, the sender is paying to have it delivered to your door, so an overburdened postman is no excuse.

Exactly, and this is the point I made to the counter person when I finally succumbed to standing in a damn queue to collect said parcel today, given the non-delivery as promised.

She was most apologetic and while I was there contacted the person in charge of deliveries for the region, reinforced the instruction to leave parcels, and faxed this through to that person.
Her fax included the request for the delivery person to phone me to confirm the standing instruction, location to leave parcel etc.

Her explanation was that there had recently been a change of delivery staff and the new people appear not to have caught up with standing directions.

 

[quinny]

Indeed.
My real mail problems aren't with Australia Post however. They are with the snails that keep going inside the letterbox whenever it rains (like today...) and eating the mail. I recently had a 50 page document delivered, and there was a hole eaten straight through all 50 pages. They've also eaten a water bill and, more importantly, a cheque in recent times.

I'm generally not keen on poisoning anything since all the various creatures fit into the ecosystem somehow, but it's time for these snails to go...

We cover the bottom of our mailbox with salt. That keeps the snails out.

It only stops working when junk mail is sticking out of the letterbox, allowing the snails to bypass the salt.

 

[bellenuit]

Australia Post isn't the only delivery company that makes you wonder about service.

I just received a note in my mailbox from TNT regarding a missed delivery. Fair enough, the sender doesn't allow them to leave the parcel when the recipient isn't there. The card asks that I go to their "redelivery" website and chose from the available redelivery options. The choices are to either redeliver to the same address or for me to go to their depot to pick up.

As I am away from the house many times during the day, I thought picking up from the depot might be a good choice. But where is the depot? It doesn't give that detail on the "redelivery" website nor on their main home page. So I give them a call and the guy I spoke to said that they won't tell me where the depot is until I chose the "pick up from the depot option", in which case they will email me when the parcel is ready for collection and provide the address details in the email. He said this was to prevent people going to the depot before the parcel is available and perhaps having to wait for hours.

However, how can one make the choice to collect from the depot without knowing whether that is going to be a 1 km journey or 50 km journey? I need to know that to see if it is worth the effort to drive there. And surely they could easily avoid the arriving too early issue by just having a note on the website to say not to go to the depot until you receive the e-mail or SMS telling you to do so (or maybe do like Australia Post do and give a general collection time such as after 10am next morning).

After explaining my dilemma regarding not being able to chose the best option if I didn't know where the depot was, he told me the depot suburb but not the street address. As that suburb would have entailed a 30 km round journey, I decided to let them redeliver.

So I am forced to make an unnecessary phone call because they haven't properly thought out their processes and the implications for the customer.

 

[AngusSmart]

If you believe this to be consistently the case, perhaps you should leave a sticker on your door the next time you are expecting a parcel saying something like: "Post Office Person. If no one answers, please remove this sticker from door". Then if you get the card in your mailbox and the sticker hasn't been removed, you may have some evidence to argue your case that they don't bother delivering. Remember, the sender is paying to have it delivered to your door, so an overburdened postman is no excuse.

Got a note at the door, the contractor knows what to do.. i do have a fair bit of volume and most fairly large so the normal post bike guy never delivered them..


I'm sure its days when the usual contractor is off, but i am also sure that Aus post just does this anyway..

80% of what i have delivered is usually left at the door.

 

[Tanaka]

My experience getting passport renewed was pretty poor. Went to website to find which Post Office could do passports in my area, the website tells you which one to go to but didn’t mention anywhere on their website to make an appointment.

I go into the empty post office with three ladies standing behind the counter talking about the footy results waited in queue while they continued their discussion about the footy, I finally get called up with my paper work and they tell me that I needed to make an appointment. I point out that it shouldn’t take too long if we do it now as no one was in the store, she said they were “busy”.

I felt the urge to strangle the b**ch, if she was a man I may have punched him. But being the nice guy I am I politely asked her to book me an appointment .

Came back the next day for the appointment, went through all the paper work but I had forgotten 1 document, okay I will bring it back right away I only live 5 minutes away. I come back within 15 minutes and I am told I would need to make another appointment. I explained once again that the shop was empty and that I had just explained my intentions to get the last document. She stands by her statement and I politely ask to speak to the manager, she is the manager. I ask her to put me on the phone to her manager. At this stage she roles her eyes back, huffs and puffs and complies with my request to finish my visa.

I completing understand Julia’s frustration.

But sadly Australia Post is not the worst company in Australia, Jetstar is. But I won’t hijack this thread with that complaint.

 

[Julia]

However, how can one make the choice to collect from the depot without knowing whether that is going to be a 1 km journey or 50 km journey? I need to know that to see if it is worth the effort to drive there.

Such a simple and fundamental point. Just unbelievable that they should not have covered this.

My experience getting passport renewed was pretty poor. Went to website to find which Post Office could do passports in my area, the website tells you which one to go to but didn’t mention anywhere on their website to make an appointment.

I go into the empty post office with three ladies standing behind the counter talking about the footy results waited in queue while they continued their discussion about the footy, I finally get called up with my paper work and they tell me that I needed to make an appointment. I point out that it shouldn’t take too long if we do it now as no one was in the store, she said they were “busy”.

I felt the urge to strangle the b**ch, if she was a man I may have punched him. But being the nice guy I am I politely asked her to book me an appointment .

Came back the next day for the appointment, went through all the paper work but I had forgotten 1 document, okay I will bring it back right away I only live 5 minutes away. I come back within 15 minutes and I am told I would need to make another appointment. I explained once again that the shop was empty and that I had just explained my intentions to get the last document. She stands by her statement and I politely ask to speak to the manager, she is the manager. I ask her to put me on the phone to her manager. At this stage she roles her eyes back, huffs and puffs and complies with my request to finish my visa.

I completing understand Julia’s frustration.

But sadly Australia Post is not the worst company in Australia, Jetstar is. But I won’t hijack this thread with that complaint.

Tanaka, I'd encourage you to lodge a complaint about this via the Australia Post website. If they get enough customers objecting to the sort of utter rubbish you have been subjected to, they might do something about it.

I don't want to go through life complaining about every minor inconvenience, but there are times when the behaviour of usually government departments is so woefully bad, we do need to yell in pain and insist on an explanation.

My complaint has, I am advised, now 'progressed in the queue' so to speak, and been passed on to the Dispute Resolution section who, I am further assured, will be most concerned to discover why their service failed in this instance.

I am not holding my breath for the outcome.

 

[Tanaka]

Tanaka, I'd encourage you to lodge a complaint about this via the Australia Post website. If they get enough customers objecting to the sort of utter rubbish you have been subjected to, they might do something about it.

I should have lodged a complaint. Too late now as over a year ago.

For good karma I have a 3 compliments to every 1 complaint policy, recently I don't complain because I find it too hard to find compliments to keep my policy in check. I complained with 3 different flights with Jetstar and each time I received a $100 voucher for my next flight. The last time they gave me the $100 voucher I sent it back to them with a letter stating how the $100 voucher was worthless as I wasn't going to ever fly with them again. That was 3 months ago and still no response.

Don't get me wrong we need to complain, I used to be a very active complainer and I mastered the art of complaining. But the process involved with most big companies and government departments is so time consuming that it wears you down and takes away from your life. I believe if we all gave more compliments then we would have happier employees and better service, positive reinforcement

I heard a story about the late Kerry Packer, it’s probably an urban myth but a good story about customer service and giving compliments.

Kerry and his associates were looking for a place to eat late one night. They went to a café and walked in, the manager told them he was closing, one of the associates stepped forward and said but this is Kerry Packer. The manager said ‘no, we are closing’. They then walked to the café across the road and asked if they could get a feed. The waiter said we are closing but we’ll make an exception as the group was large. At the end of the night Kerry Packer called the waiter over to the table and said ‘I’m going to give you a tip but you need to promise me you will walk across the road tomorrow morning and tell that café’s manager how much’ …Kerry hands over $10,000 to the waiter.

Wouldn't it be nice if we were in a position where we could do that for good customer service.

 

[sptrawler]

Australia Post, I wish they would stop patting themselves on the back and try to spend as much time improving their systems.

Today I was told by star track to expect a pretty expensive delivery, I had to leave home at 12.30, but the 40 year old daughter was home.

At 16.00 I checked tracking and it said delivered at 12.50, I sms'd the daughter and she said it hadn't been delivered.

So I ring star track at 16.00, they say it has been signed for, but they can't give much info, because it was subbied out to a third party.

So who is responsible for the delivery and what if the delivery can't be found? Is there any comeback?

 

[Ferret]

Hope you track it down SP.

I've noticed a lot of deliverers taking a photo of the item and where it has been left. That would show if it was left at the wrong address.

 

[sptrawler]

Hope you track it down SP.

I've noticed a lot of deliverers taking a photo of the item and where it has been left. That would show if it was left at the wrong address.

Apparently not, if they have sub contracted the last mile.
I have a camera on the driveway and no one came down at the time of said delivery, I have worked out what happened because the delivery finally arrived later in the evening.
I think that the Star track courier, signed it over to the third party courier, then it came up as delivered at 12.50.
When in reality it wasn't, well that's my guess, I'll find out tomorrow when I ring for answers.

The issue still is, if you buy something on the internet and they send it in good faith with Australia Post, but they then on sell the last mile to a third party and when that third party picks it up it is signed off as delivered.

Who do you chase up, if it actually doesn't arrive at your door, the vendor has fulfilled his obligation by sending and having proof of delivery.

The carrier has fulfilled their obligation by having proof of delivery, what obligation if any is on the third party? Also trying to prove your case may be an issue, it probably would end up with the purchaser just banging their heads against a wall IMO.

I bring this up because I had a similar incident with Aliexpress, I purchased an item that wasn't available in Australia for an electric scooter.

The item never arrived and I opened a dispute, the seller posted as evidence a delivery document showing delivered, I highlighted that the delivery document was for an item sent to the Netherlands(postNL) not to Australia.
Alliexpress said they have shown it was delivered suck it up princess.
So I'm just concerned we are heading down the same path, meanwhile everyone is patting themselves on the back, for doing a great job getting us there. ?
By the way I will give the ACCC a heads up on this, because IMO it is a mine field.
When you contract a courier, it is their responsibility to ensure that tracking, if provided is provided, they can pass on responsibility, but not accountability to a third party.
They took the contract, to deliver the parcel from A to B, not From A to whoever.

 

[moXJO]

Delivery of anything is shocking at the moment.

 

[wayneL]

Sidebar:

I miss Julia.

 

[sptrawler]

Sidebar:

I miss Julia.

Absolutely, she would tear some ar$es on here. ?

 

[sptrawler]

Delivery of anything is shocking at the moment.

Delivery delays I can forgive, pizz poor systems that abdicate them of their responsibility to actually deliver the item, I can't.

 

[moXJO]

Delivery delays I can forgive, pizz poor systems that abdicate them of their responsibility to actually deliver the item, I can't.

Responsibility seems to be absent a lot lately.

 

[sptrawler]

Responsibility seems to be absent a lot lately.

That is so true, Australia has become a place where every problem is not theirs, it is some one else's to solve.

 

[IFocus]

Delivery of anything is shocking at the moment.

Waited 2 months for PU glue out of NSW at the same time got 50 lengths 2.2mt x 300mm x 5mm of Paulownia wood out of the Rear Wang Village, Taoyuan Town, Cao County, Heze City, Shandong Province in 7 days, go figure.

 

[sptrawler]

Waited 2 months for PU glue out of NSW at the same time got 50 lengths 2.2mt x 300mm x 5mm of Paulownia wood out of the Rear Wang Village, Taoyuan Town, Cao County, Heze City, Shandong Province in 7 days, go figure.

Your not going into the surfboard making business, are you? ?