Can anyone help on my Cash4phones and the Royal Mail dilemma

funkyfifer

Hi all, I hope I have posted this in the correct part of the forum, if not please accept my apologies and feel free to move it to a more appropriate part of the forums.
I will try to keep this as brief as possible, my query is in regards to a mobile phone recycling company called cash4phones, based in London.
In early December I used a few comparison sites and this company kept coming up with the best deal for my Samsung Galaxy sII phone with an offer of £251.
The phone itself costs £450 to buy in the shops and I am aware I could have sold it on ebay etc, but I needed money fast and as the phone was a free upgrade, and only 2 months old and hardly used, I decided to accept the £251 as anything was better than nothing!
To cut a long story short, I sent the phone all packaged securely in their prepaid envelope, made sure it was recorded delivery so could be tracked in case of problems.
A week later I had heard nothing so called the company to ask if they had received it yet as although I posted it December 16, I posted other letters on same day and they all arrived at their destination.
The man on the phone, Mohammed advised me that there was a slight delay in Royal Mail deliveries and I should wait till the next week, however when I mentioned the fact it was recorded, signed for, he asked me for the tracking number so he could check it on the Royal Mail website.
Before I did this, I checked the parcel myself and was shocked to see it had been delivered and signed for on the 19th December at 11am, I have a copy of the signature of the person who signed it and a name but cash4phones are now saying that whoever signed for my one phone (apparently they get thousands a week!) did not work for them and they do not have my phone!
He advised me to take it up with the royal mail as maybe I put the wrong address on the envelope, but this was not possible as it was a prepaid envelope, and I have the address it went to on my proof of posting. I phoned Royal Mail to be told that as it had been delivered and signed for, it is the responsibility of cash4phones to investigate where my phone is, which I told them, but now they are saying maybe the postman made a mistake and took it to the wrong address (highly doubtful if the company gets 1000’s of phones a week) and I should get back onto Royal mail and ask them to look into it. Royal Mail is adamant that it is not their responsibility and so after a few emails and calls I am no further forward!
Does anyone know what, if anything I can do about this, and who can help me?
Cash4phones is now basically saying they think the postman must have took my one single parcel and signed it himself in a false name!
Royal Mail is saying I have the proof, it is up to cash4phones to investigate, which I kind of agree with.
To me, it would simply be a case of checking their records of all deliveries made that day, even if only a quarter of them were signed for, someone must have sat for a while and signed the postman’s little machine for each one, they can easily check the times of the postman’s delivery that day and see if it matches when they got their delivery! I explained this and was told again to ask the Royal Mail, who told me to stick to my guns and keep at them so now I just do not know what to do!
Can anyone advise please, this is very frustrating for me and its like I am banging my head off a brick wall trying to get someone to take responsibility and hopefully I can get something for my phone.

grumbler

IMO, the entire system of recorded signed for mail is flawed. Royal Mail charge money for inefficient service and wash their hands. A 'proof' of delivery and a signature are worthless. Anybody can sign for a recorded mail with fictitious name and signature, but RM don't care and don't ask for any proofs of ID and authority like they do when you collect the post from a post office.

ETA:
That said, I think with a proof or delivery you can sue them, but I don't know if it is RM or the recipient that you can take to court in this case. It's probably worth asking at Consumer Rights board.

custardy

grumbler wrote: »

IMO, the entire system or recorded signed for mail is flawed. Royal Mail charge money for inefficient service and wash their hands. A 'proof' of delivery and a signature are worthless. Anybody can sign for a recorded mail with fictitious name and signature, but RM don't care and don't ask for any proofs of ID and authority like they do when you collect the post from a post office.

ETA:
That said, I think with a proof or delivery you can sue them, but I don't know if it is RM or the recipient that you can take to court in this case. It's probably worth asking at Consumer Rights board.

how many delivery services do you have that have GPS logging and require ID on delivery?

given you have proof of delivery,it looks like you may have to take small claims action against them

you won't be taking any legal action against RM.

Buzby

Agree completely. Even assuming RM deliovered the phone to the wrong recipient (and got any old signature) and the true recipient had no knowledge of it, still places an obligation of them to show that it did not arrive at the true destination. A Small Claims action would be the only answer, and the firm would have to prove to the court's satsfaction that RM was wrong.

Incidentally, RD isn't tracked, it is only a signature on delivery, and no compensation of any kind is payable if lost. Due to the value, Special Delivery is the ONLY way to send phones and retain the full cost in the event of a claim. (Although irrelevant in this case).

im-lost

Send cash4phones a letter before action, giving 14 days to pay you or return your phone.
If they fail to do so file a claim at the courts for the full cost of the phone to replace.

They will have to prove that it wasn't delivered to them, as you have tracking to state it has.

They can either pay up and take the matter up with their insurers or royal mail, or they can
defend it in which case they will lose.

You will probably win by default. Then you have the long draw out process of getting them
to pay.

grumbler

Buzby wrote: »

...still places an obligation of them to show that it did not arrive at the true destination. ...

im-lost wrote: »

...They will have to prove that it wasn't delivered to them, as you have tracking to state it has....

As I said above, I don't know how to handle this case. However, how can a recipient prove that something was not delivered to them? The recipient can only say this and the other side has to be able to prove them wrong.

Only a sender or RM can prove that it was delivered, but the 'proof' that RM have looks very doubtful to me.

custardy

grumbler wrote: »

As I said above, I don't know how to handle this case. However, how can a recipient to prove that something was not delivered to them?

Only a sender or RM can prove that it was delivered, but the 'proof' that RM have looks very doubtful to me.

what proof would you expect them to have?

grumbler

I don't know. As I said, the entire system is flawed. Let's say, the postman hands the parcel over to a random visitor and this visitor signs for it with fictitious signature and name. Is it a proof?

As I see it, if the mail is addressed to Mr.X at some address, it has to be delivered to Mr.X and he has to prove his identity in some way when getting it. If Mr.Y is getting the mail at this address on behalf of Mr.X, the the postman has at least to check his identity and make a note about the actual name next to the signature. Even in this case the system wouldn't be perfect as it relies on the honesty of the postman.

custardy

grumbler wrote: »

I don't know. As I said, the entire system is flawed. Let's say, the postman hands the parcel over to a random visitor and this visitor signs for it with fictitious signature and name. Is it a proof?

As I see it, if the mail is addressed to Mr.X at some address, it has to be delivered to Mr.X and he has to prove his identity in some way when getting it. If Mr.Y is getting the mail at this address on behalf of Mr.X, the the postman has at least to check his identity and make a note about the actual name next to the signature. Even in this case the system wouldn't be perfect as it relies on the honesty of the postman.

well for starters. RMs licence requires it to deliver to addresses,not people
so if you are in the property the item is addressd to,then its yours

So now you propose an entire change in the mail delivery system?
any item that requires a signature,would require the recipient to produce photo ID at the point of delivery.
So will you be looking for legislation to bring that in for couriers too?

sdduk

I have just had a look on Google and found that they get lots of complaints for scamming people

http://www.compareandrecycle.co.uk/forum/forums/73-Cash4phones

It is a hard one because all the post i have look at on that company doesn't say anything about phones going missing

So could be the postman not delivering to the right address

May be go to the police and see if they can advise or look into it worth a try because after all it is theft if some one else as it.

Buzby

I have many first hand issues where my RD mail has been signed for by a different firm at a different address, and only knew about it when they reposted it with a 'opened in error' message as an apology. As far as RM was concerned, the item was delivered.

As for the OP, these firms are well known for being 'flexible' so a court would need to see their records for inbound goods to check it hasn't been purposefully forgotten about.