Royal Mail postage weight problem, under-weight limit item refused by Post Office

dynamicddd

Hi, I am seeking opinion of others to establish if I'm wrong or not.

I send a fair few letters by Royal Mail 2nd Class using labels generated from a sales platform. The letters are always within the standard letter size and weight limit of 100g. The sales platform auto-populates the letter weight. Today one of the labels erroneously printed with a weight of 1g. When I took the letters to the post office the desk clerk noticed this one and asked me to put it on the scales. The actual weight of the letter was 18g. The clerk and the Manager point blank refused to accept the letter as it is an under-declared weight. I countered that as it is under 100g there shouldn't be a problem as the amount of postage paid is sufficient but they stood firm and I could not send the letter. If it was 118g I would have been happy to pay extra postage. What would have happened if it were declared weight of 50g but actual weight by their scales 60g? It's still under 100g so surely should be acceptable - am I right or wrong do you think?

elsien

Given that if there is a dispute about whether something has been stolen on route the weight can be used to evidence what was in the package, that may be why they’re not accepting something that is clearly wrong?

soolin

dynamicddd said:

Hi, I am seeking opinion of others to establish if I'm wrong or not.

I send a fair few letters by Royal Mail 2nd Class using labels generated from a sales platform. The letters are always within the standard letter size and weight limit of 100g. The sales platform auto-populates the letter weight. Today one of the labels erroneously printed with a weight of 1g. When I took the letters to the post office the desk clerk noticed this one and asked me to put it on the scales. The actual weight of the letter was 18g. The clerk and the Manager point blank refused to accept the letter as it is an under-declared weight. I countered that as it is under 100g there shouldn't be a problem as the amount of postage paid is sufficient but they stood firm and I could not send the letter. If it was 118g I would have been happy to pay extra postage. What would have happened if it were declared weight of 50g but actual weight by their scales 60g? It's still under 100g so surely should be acceptable - am I right or wrong do you think?

I had a Post office like that-although nowadays  none of my labels show anything other than the weight band. At the time other post offices would have accepted them as long as they were within the weight bands. There doesn't seem to be any pattern to it at all.

soolin

elsien said:

Given that if there is a dispute about whether something has been stolen on route the weight can be used to evidence what was in the package, that may be why they’re not accepting something that is clearly wrong?

I doubt weight plays much of a factor in RM claims. All my labels only show a weight band , so for a letter it would merely show the up to 100g, and likewise for parcels and letters. I buy labels mainly from ebay, but RM online is the same.

Even if I use the machines at the PO they only print the weight band. 

dynamicddd

elsien said:

Given that if there is a dispute about whether something has been stolen on route the weight can be used to evidence what was in the package, that may be why they’re not accepting something that is clearly wrong?

Hi elsien, the Manager even said that I should have declared it as 100g (to avoid the issue *they* were making!). I don't think their concerns were anything to do with 'evidence'. I was attempting to use a service that for the price paid would allow letters up to 100g. My thoughts are that because the letter was under the max limit it shouldn't have been a problem even though the weight displayed was 17g off.

saajan_12

Newbie (to this topic) so forgive my basic thinking, but did the auto-generated weight actually get encoded in the franking? Could you just change the stated weight to 18g or a range while at the Post Office? 

soolin

saajan_12 said:

Newbie (to this topic) so forgive my basic thinking, but did the auto-generated weight actually get encoded in the franking? Could you just change the stated weight to 18g or a range while at the Post Office? 

It isn't encoded in the label apart from the weight band, and there are very few systems now that generate 'actual' weight limits on labels. If it's anything like my labels I couldn't' change any part of them when getting them receipted at PO, I put them on the scale and they scan them to ensure I am within the correct weight band for the postage and they chuck them straight into bags or cages behind them.

If I take them to the mail centre for receipts they aren't even weighed.

My postage scales only weighs in 5g increments anyway so for such much minor differences it would be unlike to get picked up anyway. 

dynamicddd

soolin said:

saajan_12 said:

Newbie (to this topic) so forgive my basic thinking, but did the auto-generated weight actually get encoded in the franking? Could you just change the stated weight to 18g or a range while at the Post Office? 

It isn't encoded in the label apart from the weight band, and there are very few systems now that generate 'actual' weight limits on labels. If it's anything like my labels I couldn't' change any part of them when getting them receipted at PO, I put them on the scale and they scan them to ensure I am within the correct weight band for the postage and they chuck them straight into bags or cages behind them.

If I take them to the mail centre for receipts they aren't even weighed.

My postage scales only weighs in 5g increments anyway so for such much minor differences it would be unlike to get picked up anyway. 

I think the weight IS encoded into the QR code that is printed alongside the address, but it was still under the 100g limit. What makes it worse is there's only one post office in which I have issue(s), and it's the one I used today. It's in the town I live in and I knew I should have gone elsewhere today! I will give them a swerve from now on as every other post office I use will type in the weight as per their scales (if the system generates a weight of say 50g, but the letter is actually 42g or 75g or whatever (under 100g) they just input the weight and put it in the sack for collection. Given the letter was under 100g do you think they were right to refuse it or should they have just put 18g into their terminal (as per every other post office who even bother to weigh)?

RFW

I might be missing something but why don't you just put it in a post box?

Spoonie_Turtle

RFW said:

I might be missing something but why don't you just put it in a post box?

For proof of postage, perhaps - in the OP it mentions the labels are generated by a sales platform.

Money_Grabber13579

I use Royal Mail eBay integration and I had a similar thing happen, where I put 2g rather than 2kg. The postman collected it and it got delivered fine. I really can’t see how they could charge a fee for insufficient postage, when the postage paid matched that which should have been paid, so it’s an error that makes no difference in practice.