Spectos/Royal Mail Monitoring and Posting Panel

silvercar

quoia said:

TomandBarbara said:

Antbingley said:

I too always use parcel boxes instead of going to the post office. 

Only once so far did I have to "abort mission" and use the post office instead (luckily I still had the bag and manifest etc).

The parcels that time were definitely larger than the normal "cube" and were designed to fall into the medium parcel category.   Normally all the parcels fall into the small parcel category, don't they? 

I tried then in the parcel box but wouldn't fit - too tall 

Yes I have just measured this one and it is 18cm height so assuming won't fit.  Don't think I want to risk getting it stuck but then I'm also not too keen on having to go post office on a busy Saturday morning as that's the only time I can go in my postcode area   

I don't know what the problem is ?
Since the days of Kantar and the introduction of the sack and the manifesto it has never been  SO EASY
I've never had to queue at the counter like before they were introduced
That's THE WHOLE POINT
The longest ever it has taken to leave a sack was about 90 seconds
Generally it is less than half a minute

The best I have achieved was 14 seconds from locking the car and entering the PO to climbing back in the car and sitting behind the steering wheel

I have to queue to get the manifest scanned. I’m then told to dump it on the pile in the corner. I do wonder what would happen if I just dumped it without getting the manifest scanned.

TomandBarbara

quoia said:

TomandBarbara said:

Antbingley said:

I too always use parcel boxes instead of going to the post office. 

Only once so far did I have to "abort mission" and use the post office instead (luckily I still had the bag and manifest etc).

The parcels that time were definitely larger than the normal "cube" and were designed to fall into the medium parcel category.   Normally all the parcels fall into the small parcel category, don't they? 

I tried then in the parcel box but wouldn't fit - too tall 

Yes I have just measured this one and it is 18cm height so assuming won't fit.  Don't think I want to risk getting it stuck but then I'm also not too keen on having to go post office on a busy Saturday morning as that's the only time I can go in my postcode area   

I don't know what the problem is ?
Since the days of Kantar and the introduction of the sack and the manifesto it has never been  SO EASY
I've never had to queue at the counter like before they were introduced
That's THE WHOLE POINT
The longest ever it has taken to leave a sack was about 90 seconds
Generally it is less than half a minute

The best I have achieved was 14 seconds from locking the car and entering the PO to climbing back in the car and sitting behind the steering wheel

The post office near me were very funny about dropping off the sacks and used to be awkward about the manifest.
The other post office (since closed hence why my P/O is always busy) used to question why I was using a mailbag for just a couple of boxes.

quoia

TomandBarbara said:

quoia said:

TomandBarbara said:

Antbingley said:

I too always use parcel boxes instead of going to the post office. 

Only once so far did I have to "abort mission" and use the post office instead (luckily I still had the bag and manifest etc).

The parcels that time were definitely larger than the normal "cube" and were designed to fall into the medium parcel category.   Normally all the parcels fall into the small parcel category, don't they? 

I tried then in the parcel box but wouldn't fit - too tall 

Yes I have just measured this one and it is 18cm height so assuming won't fit.  Don't think I want to risk getting it stuck but then I'm also not too keen on having to go post office on a busy Saturday morning as that's the only time I can go in my postcode area   

I don't know what the problem is ?
Since the days of Kantar and the introduction of the sack and the manifesto it has never been  SO EASY
I've never had to queue at the counter like before they were introduced
That's THE WHOLE POINT
The longest ever it has taken to leave a sack was about 90 seconds
Generally it is less than half a minute

The best I have achieved was 14 seconds from locking the car and entering the PO to climbing back in the car and sitting behind the steering wheel

The post office near me were very funny about dropping off the sacks and used to be awkward about the manifest.
The other post office (since closed hence why my P/O is always busy) used to question why I was using a mailbag for just a couple of boxes.

But that's because THEY ARE IDIOTS !

You are using what is called the DROP & GO

As advertised on the PO website

Why use Drop & Go?

It’s fast. Really fast

There's no waiting at the counter, weighing or printing postage labels. We’ll process your items and charge them to your online account

I've only ever been to the counter in just 1 of the over 20 (maybe 30) times I've taken a sack to a PO
Usually I just attract the attention of ANYONE who works at the PO by waving the manifest in one hand whilst holding the sack in the other (at a similar "shoulder" height) and as soon as they see me they point & indicate just to leave it in a designated location (where there are usually several other similar sacks piled up)
Rarely do they scan the manifest whilst I'm there.
Usually I just leave it tucked into the cable tie that's around the neck of the sack

SIMPLES !

MABLE

My local post office is brilliant.  Never any fuss.  

silvercar

quoia said:

TomandBarbara said:

quoia said:

TomandBarbara said:

Antbingley said:

I too always use parcel boxes instead of going to the post office. 

Only once so far did I have to "abort mission" and use the post office instead (luckily I still had the bag and manifest etc).

The parcels that time were definitely larger than the normal "cube" and were designed to fall into the medium parcel category.   Normally all the parcels fall into the small parcel category, don't they? 

I tried then in the parcel box but wouldn't fit - too tall 

Yes I have just measured this one and it is 18cm height so assuming won't fit.  Don't think I want to risk getting it stuck but then I'm also not too keen on having to go post office on a busy Saturday morning as that's the only time I can go in my postcode area   

I don't know what the problem is ?
Since the days of Kantar and the introduction of the sack and the manifesto it has never been  SO EASY
I've never had to queue at the counter like before they were introduced
That's THE WHOLE POINT
The longest ever it has taken to leave a sack was about 90 seconds
Generally it is less than half a minute

The best I have achieved was 14 seconds from locking the car and entering the PO to climbing back in the car and sitting behind the steering wheel

The post office near me were very funny about dropping off the sacks and used to be awkward about the manifest.
The other post office (since closed hence why my P/O is always busy) used to question why I was using a mailbag for just a couple of boxes.

But that's because THEY ARE IDIOTS !

You are using what is called the DROP & GO

As advertised on the PO website

Why use Drop & Go?

It’s fast. Really fast

There's no waiting at the counter, weighing or printing postage labels. We’ll process your items and charge them to your online account

I've only ever been to the counter in just 1 of the over 20 (maybe 30) times I've taken a sack to a PO
Usually I just attract the attention of ANYONE who works at the PO by waving the manifest in one hand whilst holding the sack in the other (at a similar "shoulder" height) and as soon as they see me they point & indicate just to leave it in a designated location (where there are usually several other similar sacks piled up)
Rarely do they scan the manifest whilst I'm there.
Usually I just leave it tucked into the cable tie that's around the neck of the sack

SIMPLES !

I always queue. They always scan it and then tell me to attach the manifest to the cable tie and leave it in the corner. Can I really just dump and go?

fluffig

I always queue. They always scan it and then tell me to attach the manifest to the cable tie and leave it in the corner. Can I really just dump and go?

I’d never heard of drop and go before I read the other post just now. So I’ve always queued too. I’ve never seen anything dumped in a corner customer side of the counter. The post office staff always take it from me and place it their side of the counter.

HonestJohn

Not everybody has a larger PO with 'Drop and Go'. It is ridiculous to suggest that the process of despatching mail sacks is 'simples' just because theirs is. Over the years most of the larger POs have closed in favour of small businesses. You only have to read back through this thread and the previous Kantar one to understand the problems.
I am sure a lot of the problems are due to staff training. My local PO has shrunk down over the years from a major part of a family business to a corner of an 'open all hours' operation. Now they take parcels from many different companies. They hardly have any space let alone designated areas and qualified staff. 

fluffig

HonestJohn said:

Not everybody has a larger PO with 'Drop and Go'. It is ridiculous to suggest that the process of despatching mail sacks is 'simples' just because theirs is. Over the years most of the larger POs have closed in favour of small businesses. You only have to read back through this thread and the previous Kantar one to understand the problems.
I am sure a lot of the problems are due to staff training. My local PO has shrunk down over the years from a major part of a family business to a corner of an 'open all hours' operation. Now they take parcels from many different companies. They hardly have any space let alone qualified space. 

Yours sounds similar to ours - which is a tiny counter in a small Spar shop. Back in Kantar days they paid ?£2 for a mailbag and I’d always thought that was for the general inconvenience and time taken to hand it over.

quoia

fluffig said:

HonestJohn said:

Not everybody has a larger PO with 'Drop and Go'. It is ridiculous to suggest that the process of despatching mail sacks is 'simples' just because theirs is. Over the years most of the larger POs have closed in favour of small businesses. You only have to read back through this thread and the previous Kantar one to understand the problems.
I am sure a lot of the problems are due to staff training. My local PO has shrunk down over the years from a major part of a family business to a corner of an 'open all hours' operation. Now they take parcels from many different companies. They hardly have any space let alone qualified space. 

Yours sounds similar to ours - which is a tiny counter in a small Spar shop. Back in Kantar days they paid ?£2 for a mailbag and I’d always thought that was for the general inconvenience and time taken to hand it over.

Which sounds exactly like the one I use 90%+ of the time.
The secure counter area is no bigger than an 8 by 6 garden shed in the corner of a odd sort of shop.
Odd in several ways...

A third of the premises is a totally separate florist business (with access through the same front door) with its own staff that have nothing to do with the PO side or anything else that you can buy within the same 4 walls

It sells food but you would never describe it as a food shop and it's rather limited to be described as a general store.
A variety of what I suppose you'd call "craft" items and niknaks or ornaments seem to adorn many shelves.

The place I leave a mail sack is almost always just inside one of those wheeled 3 sided metal cages, about 2ft by 3ft and 5 feet high that you often see in supermarkets.

HonestJohn

I had my first cube with Spectos today with 18cm sides. Someone had squashed one side down to 14cm maybe to fit a parcel box. This changes it from a medium parcel to a small parcel incidentally.