Recently I’ve needed to order a number of items from Amazon. However, between them and the Post Office receiving them has been made rather difficult.

Let’s start with Amazon themselves. Apparently randomly (I’m sure there is a pattern but I’m not sure what it is – I think it’s for bulky ) Amazon will use their own courier and they are, without doubt, rubbish. They turn up during the day , when nobody is at home, and leave a card behind. This indicates the parcel has been missed and they’ll try 3 times, but only on weekdays, to redeliver. Otherwise it goes to a collection point which, in my case, is quite a distance away. Needless to say, they tried delivery yesterday and are due to do so again today (still nobody is at home). I had an alert on my phone from the Amazon app to say they’d taken it back to their depot for pick up (not even a third attempt) but when I click on the message it took me to my order details with none of this mentioned on it – according to their own site it’s still out for delivery. Where it is and how I’ll get it is still an unknown.

Now, Amazon do allow you to specify where a parcel should go if nobody is at home but it’s overly specific – you can either state somewhere from a drop-down list (e.g. a shed) or specify a neighbour. But you can’t say “any neighbour” but have to give the name and address of one. So, using their chat I had my delivery details set to somewhere which isn’t on their drop-down. But it’s never used – it never shows on my delivery information but if I contact Amazon they tell me the same instructions are in use.

Delivery Update

Imagine my surprise then when I received an update – this time reflected on their site – to say it had been delivered!

Great. Except it’s been handed over to the residence and… well… nobody is at home. Who have they given it to? Well, getting home I found the answer…

Yes, that’s right. They’d left the package under a bench (which is not my chosen “safe place”) yet updated their information to say it had been handed over. So, who trusts an Amazon courier? Don’t all raise your hands at once.

So, let’s turn to the Post Office. After missing a parcel on Friday I went to pick it up on Friday from my local depot (and thankfully this one IS local). They couldn’t find it but it took them 20 minutes before they told me this. I returned on Monday, whereupon they’d found it. Yesterday I also missed a parcel so back to the depot I went. The card said there had been 2 parcels. They found 1 and, yep, you guessed it, the 2nd one was AWOL. After 15 minutes they came to the conclusion that maybe the 2nd parcel didn’t exist and was maybe referring to a parcel for another house that had been tied up with it. Was I expecting any others? Well, yes, but I have no idea when they’re due. So, I’ve been left with a vague sense of unease, not sure if the PO have lost a parcel.

Some things in life are really more stressful than they really need to be!