The Postman

zenmaster

wearside wrote:

This thread has opened up a can of worms. We all seem to have our own opinions about posties, some good some bad. IMO they are nowhere near as good as say 5-10 years ago.

I think you will find the posties are no different to those of years gone by - some good, some not so - it's the service that has worsened.

There are many reasons for this - privatisation, deregulation, and the fact that they now employ less staff to deliver more mail are chief among them.

My best mate is a postie and loves it (most of the time) but I wouldn't do it for anything.

Swattie

I guess I'm really luckt to have a good postie as well - and I'm at the beginning of his round, so I get my post around 8am-ish except when he's on a day off or hols.
I always leave a little gift at Christmas for both the postman and bin-men just to say thanks.

everythingblogcast

Swattie wrote:

I guess I'm really luckt to have a good postie as well - and I'm at the beginning of his round, so I get my post around 8am-ish except when he's on a day off or hols.
I always leave a little gift at Christmas for both the postman and bin-men just to say thanks.

Its there job, the bin men get paid via Rates and most of the time they dont collect your bin. It was their choice to be bin men/women.

And postie the same thing they dicided to be posties.

snoozy

I wish our post service was as good as those mentioned above.

No wingeing about getting post late in the am - ours comes between 2:30-3pm!!!!! It's ridiculous.

We also tend to have a different postie each day. If I am getting a parcel delivered, half of the time they don't bring it out with them and just put a card through the door - I have cuaght them doing this and they say it's beacuse the parcel is too heavy to carry on their round with them :mad: (I should mention that when I collect the parcels they are not heavy at all).

My other gripe is that they have recently reduced the hours that the parcel collection window is open at our local sorting office so it's only open til 3pm. What use is that to people who work? (and who are presumably the vast majority of people who have to collect parcels).

I remember back in the day (about 10 years ago) when our post was always delivered before I got up in the morning. The service today is pathetic in comparison.

uktim29

snoozy wrote:

We also tend to have a different postie each day. If I am getting a parcel delivered, half of the time they don't bring it out with them and just put a card through the door - I have cuaght them doing this and they say it's beacuse the parcel is too heavy to carry on their round with them :mad: (I should mention that when I collect the parcels they are not heavy at all).

I don't think they mean the weight. I have this vision in my head of your postman trying to carry 12 large boxes as well as his normal delivery bag.

Which to be honest, I don't think someone could do without some other means.

snoozy

No, most often they are a padded envelope (e.g. I buy a lot of paperbacks from ebay), or a letter that needs to be signed for. Anyway, even if it were a large box (which it never has been so far), isn't it fair to expect Royal Mail to attempt to deliver it some way, whether it be by postie on foot or by mail van. Otherwise, they are not delivering the parcel at all. They're taking it halfway then making me go and collect it. That's not the service that is being paid for. That's like me opening a restaurant and saying that if you have a hamburger that's fine, I will cook it for you and bring it to your table, but if you order a steak, I will get it out of the fridge for you but you have to come to the kitchen and cook it yourself then take it to your table.

PercyPig

snoozy wrote:

No, most often they are a padded envelope (e.g. I buy a lot of paperbacks from ebay), or a letter that needs to be signed for. Anyway, even if it were a large box (which it never has been so far), isn't it fair to expect Royal Mail to attempt to deliver it some way, whether it be by postie on foot or by mail van. Otherwise, they are not delivering the parcel at all. They're taking it halfway then making me go and collect it. That's not the service that is being paid for. That's like me opening a restaurant and saying that if you have a hamburger that's fine, I will cook it for you and bring it to your table, but if you order a steak, I will get it out of the fridge for you but you have to come to the kitchen and cook it yourself then take it to your table.

Fair enough, they should try to deliver it, that's what they have vans and drivers for. Our postie has a habit of leaving our parcels in the recycling bin next to the door, I am always scared he will do it on the day they collect the bin for emptying.

However, I am glad to see some people sticking up for posties. My OH is one (seems to be a few of us on here ) and he works hard and I'm sure most posties do too. As others have said, they are dictated to as to what time they can leave the sorting office so it doesn't matter how close you are to it.

I personally think on the whole Royal Mail provide a fantastic service, you can send something from one end of the country to another for 32p and (on the whole) it will get there the next day ... how good is that? I know everyone has examples of bad service but I did say "on the whole"

Sherbetlover

I completely understand that postmen and women have to work in all hours and ours is ok, although we don't get our delivery until about half 12. What really annoys me is when they fill out the card for missing a parcel, they don't put who it is for on it. There are nine people living in my house! (i'm a student). Plus we have to wait 48 hours before we can collect it! It wasn't like that in York. Oh well.

sooz

my new postman seems to be getting friendlier...could it be something to do with the fact that i fly downstairs to answer the door still asleep, not really wearing the dressing gown......


i swear he's arriving earlier each morning :eek: .

peterbaker

zenmaster wrote:

I think you will find the posties are no different to those of years gone by - some good, some not so - it's the service that has worsened.

You are joking I think? And who provides the service?

The few good postmen and women are absolutely streets apart from the majority who are just a bunch of no-loyalty-to-anyone casuals, and you can pretty easily discover why that might be. Take a look at their website job section. Almost all of it is temporary contracts. If you want a real laugh, go through the process of applying for a job - you don't need to input many details to get to the 'funnies' or to speak with anyone - they want to find out if you are the right stuff before they trouble you to apply in detail - it's a bit like an online game. Don't forget to put your Alan Leighton hat on first or you won't get the right answers!

They have questions like "What would you do if a colleague phoned in sick and your manager asked you to cover for him?" I am making this up, but the three answers might easily be something like (a) Say "Well actually I feel a bit sick myself - I am not sure I will make it to the end of my own walk today", or
(b) "Yes boss that's absolutely no problem, I'll stay late until the job is done. we can't let down the customers can we?"
(c) Say "Well actually I was planning to go out with the gf tonight, I have to be home on time, sorry."

Guess which answer "Most of our postmen and women would give"?

Then you'll have another half dozen questions a bit like that. One of them is about what happens if you find some envelopes that have opened but the contents still seem to be inside. The right answer wasnt to pull them and take them to your boss, it was something like "seal them up again safely and post them on their way, we don't want to delay them!" (Honestly, I don't think I am dreaming it!)

If you have a good postman, good luck to you and him or her. If like most of us, you have a very mixed service and perhaps might see five different postpersons in a week and have to put up with some who never ring and never bring a parcel out with them, just a bunch of cards, and others who don't even leave cards causing post to go back to sender, and even more !!!!!! who don't recognise when a parcel that has been returned once already has been reposted and instead send it straight back to the sender a second time, and a sorting office that doesnt have anywhere to park your car, then you will know that the British postal Mail service is no longer worthy of the title "Royal" and anyone that thinks it is not much different to say the 1970s when I was temporary postman myself (aged 14 and officially vetted over a couple of weeks before standing in for our regular postman who had to go into hospital) is in cloud cuckoo land!

I will breath again now...Grrrr! Makes my blood boil!