# Parcels, Where do they go ?



## gus-lopez (Jan 4, 2010)

I send & have delivered parcels on a regular basis. I have been using ecoparcel recently & after the 1st shambolic pick-up it's been ok until last week. I had 2 seperate parcels picked up from the same address on the 1st Dec. & ecoparcel sent in parcelforce to collect them. The driver left two signed pick-up notes , each with different numbers & bar codes. The 1st parcel was delivered on 3rd Dec. ( wonderful ) & I asked the del. man where's the other one . " No, I've only got one " he replied. I left it 'till monday & contacted ecoparcel & they said that they only picked up 1 parcel !!!!!!!!!! Sorry I've got tickets for 2. Ecoparcel , to put it mildly the customer service is ****e . I 've contacted parcelforce & at least am getting some sense from them . 

I had the same problem some months back when items I'd ordered from Leeds were sent by the shop via Tnt who lost them. When I phoned they said that Tnt manage to lose items in the UK that they'd sent & sent me another lot , which Tnt lost yet again !! 
They used parcelforce for the 3rd lot which arrived , thank God. 

What I want to know is all of these parcels have tracking numbers , so where do they go ? If they're being stolen , how do they do it with tracking nos? If not where do they all end up, there must be a mountain of them somewhere.


----------



## Stravinsky (Aug 12, 2007)

Welcome to my world Guz
I can tell you where my recent new camera that was shipped with DHL went cos I tracked it all the way around Europe .................

From Edinburgh to East Midlands Airport to Leipzig, to Marseilles, and then to Valencia. It sat there for a week whilst they dithered, and then it went from Valencia to Marseilles, to Leipzig (where it got snagged for a day) and to East Midlands Airport. I managed to intervene there as it was about to return to Edinburgh, and then it went to Paris followed by Marseilles and then to Valencia again where they decided that the had lost my address and telephone number and so couldn't deliver it.

Then when I gave them my details again it went from Valencia to Gandia, and back to Valencia again because although I sat here all day waiting for it, they insisted they tried to deliver but I wasn't in.

At this point I drove to Valencia and collected it from the depot before they decided to send it to Abu Dhabi by mistake

Such are the workings of a parcels company. I know it happened, I tracked it on a daily basis. It took just under three weeks from start to finish

I could have driven to Scotland and back nearly 3 times in the time it took them to get it to me


----------



## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

I am always reluctant to run down the services in Spain, but post does seem to be a major headache. It took me 20 minutes to send a letter this morning because the Correos doesn t sell stamps (!) and I had to wait while they searched the entire office for a missing parcel (which they never found) before they would frank my letter.

We have had packets clearly addressed to us being returned to sender, and having to be resent to us at the original senders expense. 

I have several duplicate copies of books I had given up on ever arriving and so ordered another one.

Amazon use a company called MRW round here, and they seem to be very good (or maybe its just because the driver knows us now!)


----------



## gus-lopez (Jan 4, 2010)

Stravinsky said:


> Welcome to my world Guz
> I can tell you where my recent new camera that was shipped with DHL went cos I tracked it all the way around Europe .................
> 
> From Edinburgh to East Midlands Airport to Leipzig, to Marseilles, and then to Valencia. It sat there for a week whilst they dithered, and then it went from Valencia to Marseilles, to Leipzig (where it got snagged for a day) and to East Midlands Airport. I managed to intervene there as it was about to return to Edinburgh, and then it went to Paris followed by Marseilles and then to Valencia again where they decided that the had lost my address and telephone number and so couldn't deliver it.
> ...



Trouble is that although I have 2 signed pick-up notes from the driver , ecoparcel are stating that he only picked up 1 , even though parcelforce, who picked them up, are saying they picked up 2. There's no tracking number on the 2nd one but the 1st showed all it's travels.

Alcalaina , I've never had a problem this end it's always in the UK.

The other thing is if they only picked up 1 why have I paid for two & why aren't they asking me a) where's the other one ? b) offering to refund my money for the non-existent parcel.


----------



## Dolphin. (Aug 1, 2010)

My mother sent me something nice as a birthday present and it never turned up 

That was not on recorded delivery though, and im still expecting a sky card from 8 days ago


----------



## MaidenScotland (Jun 6, 2009)

I have just tracked a parcel from Amazon who have told me they came to the house twice and no one was in and on the 3d occasion it was the wrong address!!!


Maiden


----------



## Nignoy (Jun 4, 2010)

these postal problems are global, but as parcelforce control most of the postal freight in uk, europe and australasia,it is always a gamble sending anything by post,with any thing valuable, on collection time and date signature and name in block capitals of the driver are essential,if you look at the small print, Carriers like DHL, TNT ,Hermes and Parcelforce Premium, have a guaranteed delivery clause ,of course they wont tell you that!!acouple of years ago my stolen medals were replaced by hm,s govt, sent with parcelforce to australia registered tracking of course, mill hill to berlin, to abu dhabi were held there for a week onto singapore and then customs in brisbane in betweencustoms and postal sorting in brisbane they disappeared never to be seen again, replacement for the replacements were sent, they never even left UK!! lost again , my brother collected the 3rd set , sent them by forces post to a barracks in town 4 days later they were here, a parcel posted here in brisbane wednesday afternoon, will usually be delivered in UK within maximum 7 days, Aletter posted in brisbane to oakey, 200kms away cane take anything up to 14 days pony express and mailcoaches were faster


----------



## gus-lopez (Jan 4, 2010)

Now ecoparcel say that the parcel pick-up was cancelled on the 7th ( ?) december yet parcelforce stated this morning that according to their manifest for the day they picked up 2 parcels & cannot trace 1 of them ! & I should put in a claim. 

Just for anyone else that might have problems with ecoparcel.eu , as their customer service is ****e to say the least . You can go in to their holding company , Lex - system GmbH, & get far more sense & you can send e-mails & attachments , which you can'tdo with ecoparcel. 6 you get replies that make sense.


----------



## Guest (Dec 12, 2010)

gus, I don't know what ecoparcel is and nignoy, I must disagree, postal problems are not global. Spanish correos is a mess, yes, Alca, it is a major headache. In countries where I lived, Sweden, Germany, Japan, even France the bl**dy mail works! Not so here, random examples below:

- for 5 years I have struggled to get my mail delivered to my mail box, a central 40 boxish thingie for my part of the urbanization, they always claimed it was not built! I had to collect my mail at the post office, waiting in lines etc. Suddently there was no more mail.... but my mail box was overflowing! No notice and ofc I had no key ) Now the flow is steady, but a third of all mails are lost and 2 weeks of no mail is normal. Plenty returned to sender. Done all I can, talked to the boss of the mail men, knows nada. Talked to the mailman, says he delivers all he "finds". Dead end str.

It is no better for Spanish people. A woman I know lives on the costa, on the beach promenade, had a war for 7 years with the correos just to get her mail delivered. She runs a business from home, all her neighbours got their mail. Now it works, but no explanation from the Correos.

My gf from Japan came here for 6 months. She sent two parcels because weight on the plane was ofc limited. These got held up in customs in Madrid for 4 months! Then sent to here, Nerja, when they finally sorted out that the stuff was not importation etc. Then stuck here, then finally returned to Japan!!! In the parcels were dictionaries for my gf's studies here. Well, courses had to be cancelled. Warm clothes had to be bought etc etc. Not counting this, the cost for sending the two parcels was Euros 200. The cost for her mother back in Japan to re-collect them was E 150. Cost for cancelling language school was 50, cost for lawyer here to communicate with the customs, to produce like 20 pages of nonsense was 150 Euros. The idiot Correos sent it all back.... no excuse, no cover of the costs. Finally the, innocent, Japanese post paid back both the cost of sending the stuff and recollecting it, but it is not fair, is it?

Imo, the Spanish post are completely ignorant and incapable, a shame. My friend, Fernando, who have family in the US probably have a practical approach. His birthday presents have been lost 2 years in a row, no trace... He just adviced his family not to send anything, because the Spanish post simply does not work. Ignorance, lack of systems, arrogance, lazyness, manana and theft, there you have it.


----------



## dunmovin (Dec 19, 2008)

Alcalaina said:


> I am always reluctant to run down the services in Spain, but post does seem to be a major headache. It took me 20 minutes to send a letter this morning because the Correos doesn t sell stamps (!) and I had to wait while they searched the entire office for a missing parcel (which they never found) before they would frank my letter.
> 
> We have had packets clearly addressed to us being returned to sender, and having to be resent to us at the original senders expense.
> 
> ...


MRW are REALLY good. I got a call from their Madrid office to inform me that the packages they were deliviring would be in the local office and I could either collect them or call them later that day to have them delivered. So far, they have never failed to deliver.


----------



## lynn (Sep 25, 2008)

dunmovin said:


> MRW are REALLY good. I got a call from their Madrid office to inform me that the packages they were deliviring would be in the local office and I could either collect them or call them later that day to have them delivered. So far, they have never failed to deliver.


I agree, MRW deliver Amazon, and I've never had a problem with them. My Mum, however, has problems with all the delivery companies who flatly refuse to do the last 10 minutes of the journey to her door, so call and ask her to meet at a hotel on the mainroad, but often don't wait long enough for her to get there, so when she arrives, they've driven off into the sunset...
This Christmas I've asked people in the UK who want to send gifts to the kids to send gift cards from Amazon via email. It doesn't fill the Christmas stocking, but my kids are that bit older so understand that Santa is having a few problems with his delivery company (well, I THINK they understand, being 17, 14 and 11!!).


----------



## gus-lopez (Jan 4, 2010)

As I've said we've never had a problem with the spanish end, either delivery or pick-up, it's always the UK end.


----------



## Guest (Dec 12, 2010)

gus / that is good, probably Lorca have a better working post office than we have in Nerja on the coast. I can just add that every 3 days I pick up mail from the street and put it in the recipient's mailboxes. This is on my 200 meter walk down to my mail box. Also there I find letters on the ground. I even have a designated stone, a weight, to prevent these letters to be taken away by the wind from the shelf where I put them.

If you get a big letter which does not fit in your mail box the normal procedure in countries where the post works is that you get a notice and pick up the letter at the main post office. Not so here... either the mail man throw it inside my gate or put it on my bike just inside the gate. It may seem a nice gesture, but it is actually a very bad idea when it rains. 

My experience is that there is something very wrong with the Spanish post, it is a catastrophe and it makes it hard to live here. Maybe it is only here and maybe they throw away my mail because some people at the post office hate me because I have made complaints, but there is no solution to it. A PO box in a nearby village is not a good solution, it costs money and it makes it impossible to order stuff by mail order.


----------



## MaidenScotland (Jun 6, 2009)

I received the following email from Amazon. Tracking my order has told me that they came to the house twice and no one was in and the third occasion it was the wrong address
We're contacting you regarding your Amazon.co.uk enquiry. 

As a result of poor weather conditions in the UK, our carriers are experiencing delays delivering orders to some parts of the country. Because of the resulting backlog, the delivery of your order may take longer than expected. 

We're working with our carriers to make sure that orders are delivered as soon as possible. As a result, we would ask that you wait until Tuesday, December 14, 2010 before contacting us again about the status of your delivery. At that time, we hope that you will have received your order. 

We take full responsibility should your order not arrive. Please contact us again on the above date by using the link below and we will assist you further:


----------



## gus-lopez (Jan 4, 2010)

Well what do you know, the parcel that parcelforce said they never collected & ecoparcel said I'd cancelled the pick-up , was delivered by the correos this morning , so the wife is happy . 

I was telling the postman that delivered it ( in his car ) that I'd been told that it had been lost & to submit a claim. " well do that then , you'll be winning both ways " he replied.


----------



## MaidenScotland (Jun 6, 2009)

MaidenScotland said:


> I received the following email from Amazon. Tracking my order has told me that they came to the house twice and no one was in and the third occasion it was the wrong address
> We're contacting you regarding your Amazon.co.uk enquiry.
> 
> As a result of poor weather conditions in the UK, our carriers are experiencing delays delivering orders to some parts of the country. Because of the resulting backlog, the delivery of your order may take longer than expected.
> ...




Update... I contacted them on the 14th and then two hours later we had a telephone call from the carrier telling us they couldn't find us as the postcode shows up as an industrial estate this is regardless of the fact that they have delivered this year at least 10 parcels, they parcel was in a distribution centre not 2 miles from the house. Two hours after that they turned up with the parcel.
I now have my electric blankets plus the one I bought as I had given up on them being delivered 

Maiden


----------



## Nignoy (Jun 4, 2010)

english mail seems to be working well, all the xmas parcels and mail we sent has arrived safely ,we only posted them 10 days ago


----------



## generate (Aug 18, 2010)

Like others, I'm having huge trouble getting Amazon / MRW to actually deliver orders to my home.

They expect me to pick up parcels from their depot or meet the driver at a bar in the village(!), claiming that my address is impossible to find. Although we're in the campo a few kilometres along an unmade road, we're also a small hotel - we receive deliveries and our guests manage to find us every day!

MRW staff in Madrid have been great, but (despite me sending a map and directions in Spanish, GPS coordinates, and us being clearly signposted from the main road) it is the local driver who lets them down - it seems to me that he simply can't be bothered to deliver the parcels.

A big disappointment, after having used Amazon very happily for years in the UK. It makes their recent offer of free delivery on orders over £25 in Spain seem much less worthwhile.

:-(


----------



## Guest (Dec 20, 2010)

:focus: the original question was, where do these parcels go? Fine, courier services work here in Spain, but the postal services do not work, at all. Receiving parcels have not worked for me or my, (Spanish), friends, nine out of ten have been lost or stolen during the last 3 years.

The only advice that can be given, do not use the Correos, use a courier service.


----------



## Stravinsky (Aug 12, 2007)

VidaTombola said:


> :focus: the original question was, where do these parcels go? Fine, courier services work here in Spain, but the postal services do not work, at all. Receiving parcels have not worked for me or my, (Spanish), friends, nine out of ten have been lost or stolen during the last 3 years.
> 
> The only advice that can be given, do not use the Correos, use a courier service.


Correos have been fine for me ... which is a little different to the apalling service I have received from couriers. Ive had post delivered to the UK in three days from here. Coming back its slower, but we put that down to the local postman ... A friend who runs a business nearby has no problems with all his letters and parcels with Correos, but he does make a point of going to the local post office every day


----------



## Pesky Wesky (May 10, 2009)

Stravinsky said:


> Correos have been fine for me ... which is a little different to the apalling service I have received from couriers. Ive had post delivered to the UK in three days from here. Coming back its slower, but we put that down to the local postman ... A friend who runs a business nearby has no problems with all his letters and parcels with Correos, but he does make a point of going to the local post office every day


I agree with Stavinsky that I've had better service from correos than couriers. However we don't get post everyday here - only 2 or three times a week. And the town has a population of over 30.000! I believe if you live in the actual town you might get an everyday service but we live, oh it must be all of 2 mins outside by car 
I think a lot of people do what stravinsky's friend does and go directly to correos


----------

