Home delivery network - I just want my parcel!

waqqasbasit

We use couriers for trade purposes.
It is a matter of trust that however parcels are insured up to not a very high value but the trade works on belief that the service provided is of true nature not based on loosing parcels and people complaining and claiming. Claims are only accepted after courier's terms and conditions meet and they can say NO to your claims if you don't comply with their terms and conditions which is not an ideal situation if you are sending 300-500 parcels a month.
My personal opinion and past experience has taught that NOT ALL put a claim in especially if you have already bunch of paper work to do.
How can a courier loose a man size parcel and then lie about it for weeks that it is damaged and not deliver it to either parties ie sender or receiver, and say in the end "we don't know where it is"?
What a joke.

Our experience with parcelforce in the past 4 years
2 damaged out of hundreds and they compensated that for us without a hassle.
1 lost out of hundreds: Claim fulfilled without any problems.

kaydee

Just had yet another poor experience with HDNL.
Arrived home and happened to go out the back to the dustbins which live at the side of our house, behind a locked gate and found a parcel from Boden that the 'helpful' HDNL driver had thoughtfully thrown over the side gate and then neglected to let us know (by leaving a card) that he had done that!

That follows another experience with them when I apparently signed for a parcel of school clothes while I was away on holiday, then it became 'a gardener' who signed for it - except our man who does the garden was also away at that time. I contacted our neighbours but they didn't have anything.
Then 3 weeks later one of the neighbours happened to go into his garden shed, which is in the garden behind locked gates too - and found our parcel together with a delivery note saying it was left next door!

Then if you want to speak to Customer Services they expect you to pay 10p per minute for the privilege!!

intransit_2

As an ex employee of HDNL I have trawled these numerous sites complaining about HDNL's service.

As with the explanations on the other sites it is HDNL management who is totally at fault here. the system they adopt is MAXIMUM parcels out and delivered daily whilst trying to keep costs down by using the MINIMUM amount of manpower. Over the past few years the have made staff redundant and also stood by and watched staff hand in thier notices and leave { good dedicated staff} unfortunately they have shot themselves in the foot in so much as they now find themselves CONSTANTLY short staffed as they underestimated the impact of the losses, thus they have to now CONSTANTLY rely on agency staff {which has been proven long term to be MORE costly and LESS productive}

This can be demonstrated by the above post from Wkdwill about a DH {agency worker} at HDNL

"straight in at the deep end"
This is not uncommon with any company. An agency worker is supposed to be proficient in the type of work they are asked to perform i.e. if a company wants a fork truck driver they expect the agency to send a qualified fork truck driver, if HDNL want a qualified "multi drop driver" they expect to get one, so they CAN throw them in the deep end.

"Seventy drops a day on three postcodes"
If that's all DH had to do in a day he had it cushy. The average HDNL driver when asked to cover an unfamiliar route would be expected to take out {AND DELIVER} a minimum of three quarters of that routes daily target {more in busy periods} so as most of the routes are now well in excess of 160 parcels a day and some may have as many as 5 postcodes or more, well you figure it out.

"They {parcels} weren't sorted and didn't know area"
It's the same for everyone. The DRIVER doing that route is responsible for putting his/her route in order, not anyone else. and as for not knowing the area we had a thing called an A to Z

To give you an example one route {of many} I worked when I was there had one whole and two sub postcodes delivery area. This was an approximate delivery mileage of 100 miles round trip, and a minimum daily delivery target of 176 parcels. This wasn't easy but was achievable {if I didn't take any breaks and constantly exceeded the speed limit my days work was approx 9 - 10 hours} and I thought I was overworked. Now the workload at HDNL has got far worse, many drivers are doing 12 somtimes 13 hour days, thier delivery targets are usually over the 200 mark and they are disciplined for bringing parcels back. Some of these drivers { especially those with young families} have not got a social life, to them it's work and sleep, work and sleep.

The companies answer to any staff member who dares to complain is:-
"If your'e not happy you know where the door is, there's someone out there who will do it"

Complain to HDNL management DIRECTLY, stop getting on to the drivers thier hands are tied.

Forris

Intransit - a very interesting post, thanks. I will pass this info on to my sometime-colleagues at DHL (soon to be Yodel!!) and enjoy the look on their faces. Seriously, these sort of delivery targets are totally unsustainable unless you take the 'to hell with the customer' attitude.

doberryfirkin

I have just had my first 'experience' of HDNL and it looks like it may be similar to the other posters. Card through the door last week with a reference number, trouble was when I went to the website it told me the parcel couldn't be tracked. So the only recourse was to phone the inevitable 0871 number. After a few mins going through automatic responses I have re-scheduled for this week.
My issues are that there is no indication of what the parcel is (who from), date or time of attempted delivery etc, the only information being a reference number. For all I know it may have been for my neighbour - since none of us can recollect ordering anything. I intend taking the issue up with the vendor who has used HDNL, I figure it is better to get the vendor to put pressure on HDNL - going direct would be a waste of time. I also intend raising the issue with trading standards as the lack of info on the card with an invite to phone an 0871 number is almost tantamount to a scam.

custardy

doberryfirkin wrote: »

I have just had my first 'experience' of HDNL and it looks like it may be similar to the other posters. Card through the door last week with a reference number, trouble was when I went to the website it told me the parcel couldn't be tracked. So the only recourse was to phone the inevitable 0871 number. After a few mins going through automatic responses I have re-scheduled for this week.
My issues are that there is no indication of what the parcel is (who from), date or time of attempted delivery etc, the only information being a reference number. For all I know it may have been for my neighbour - since none of us can recollect ordering anything. I intend taking the issue up with the vendor who has used HDNL, I figure it is better to get the vendor to put pressure on HDNL - going direct would be a waste of time. I also intend raising the issue with trading standards as the lack of info on the card with an invite to phone an 0871 number is almost tantamount to a scam.

have you ever had a card that shows thew sender?

Forris

Some may find it surprising, but a lot of parcels don't have the senders' details on. Some don't put anything, others use a 3rd party logistics company to ship their goods.

lumpy_bum

over the past 3 days ive had an absolute nightmare with hdn.
monday, i had a card shoved through the letter box, id been in all morning, either in the front room or in the kitchen, both are by the front door, i know he didnt knock, so i rang and complained. they said it had been returned to depot and it would be out the next day, being tuesday. tuesday 5pm i ring and find that they hadnt even loaded it onto the van... so today it was apparently due to be re-delivered. i rang them at 3pm to see if it was coming, i was told it wouldnt be long at all. 5pm i ring again to be told they had no reply at my door?
what utter rubbish, myself and 3 children have been in since 3pm, 2 teenagers since 4pm. theyre liars, i cant wait until tommorow if this parcel finally arrives because i will be giving this useless lying delivery bloke a piece of my mind.



AND BREATHE

custardy

lumpy_bum wrote: »

over the past 3 days ive had an absolute nightmare with hdn.
monday, i had a card shoved through the letter box, id been in all morning, either in the front room or in the kitchen, both are by the front door, i know he didnt knock, so i rang and complained. they said it had been returned to depot and it would be out the next day, being tuesday. tuesday 5pm i ring and find that they hadnt even loaded it onto the van... so today it was apparently due to be re-delivered. i rang them at 3pm to see if it was coming, i was told it wouldnt be long at all. 5pm i ring again to be told they had no reply at my door?
what utter rubbish, myself and 3 children have been in since 3pm, 2 teenagers since 4pm. theyre liars, i cant wait until tommorow if this parcel finally arrives because i will be giving this useless lying delivery bloke a piece of my mind.



AND BREATHE

except it might not be the same driver.........

lumpy_bum

custardy wrote: »

except it might not be the same driver.........

everytime ive had a parcel from them before its been the same bloke. i willask him though, ive already thought about that one