Royal Mail Track & Trace is Pointless
I sent a parcel to Sweden on Friday - some binoculars I’d sold on Ebay. Because I sent them International Signed For, I got a tracking number to use on royalmail.com. Entering this number on Friday resulted in a message saying that the parcel hadn’t yet been entered into the system, and to wait to the next day. Fair enough - this isn’t exactly Fedex or UPS, and I posted them at a rural post office in Hursley.
But after entering the number on Saturday, I got this message: ‘We have received your item, posted on 21/07/06 and it is being processed for delivery abroad.’ Well, duh. This gives me no useful information. I posted it to a foreign country, so what else would I be expecting? And I know when I posted it. How much longer is it going to take? Are there any delays at the moment? That’s what I want to know.
After entering the number on Sunday, I got: ‘Your item, posted on 21/07/06 with reference xxx has been passed to the overseas postal service for delivery in SWEDEN.’ In other words, Royal Mail have no link to a foreign tracking system, so can’t tell me anything more about it.
Is this really the best the Royal Mail can do? Some tracking systems actually provide some useful (or at least reassuring) information - a historical record of which depot a parcel went to, and when. I know this is a cheap-ish service (eight pounds for about 450 grams), and perhaps Royal Mail can’t stretch to that. But my conclusion is: if you actually want to track your parcel closely, don’t bother with the Royal Mail.
The one time I needed proof of delivery (for a Court Case) the Track & Trace system could not locate my Recorded Delivery letter. Worse still the Help Line/Customer Services kept telling me it was lost and there was nothing that could be done because Recorded Delivery is not a priority service. I could not believe I was being told it is no different from 1st and 2nd mail, apart from getting a signature at the other end - well that was the idea!
However, when I insisted a further seach be undertaken some bright spark checked the epod (electronic proof of delivery) system to confirm my letter was indeed lost - it did the opposite - my letter was delivered and a signature given!
Apparently the Track & Trace system had not been up-dated (for one month according to the date of my letter!).
In future I will not waste time when the Track & Trace system or Customer Services say my letters are lost - I will ask immediately for an epod search.
Hope this helps someone else.
Sarah
29 Jul 06 at 03:07:07
After sending a recorded delivery letter which has apparently been lost, I sent a second letter Special Delivery.
When checking on the Track and Trace system instead of a signature, someone had printed “given to Peter.” Four telephone calls later I am still none the wiser as to who Peter is, he was not the intended recipient of my letter, and I still have no idea if my letter was delivered.
I notice it is called a track and trace system rather than service.
Sue
22 Aug 06 at 12:08:04
Sent a parcel from Birmingham to Barrow by 1st class recorded delivery. Never received. Now told that I cannot make a complaint as it has not been 15 working days since date of postage. What’s worse is that I cannot replace the documents in the parcel and cannot cashback from my mobile service provider. ROYAL MAIL SUCKS. BOYCOTT ROYAL MAIL!
Another Sue
6 Sep 06 at 16:09:05
I Tried to ttrack a parcel sent via royal mail recorded delivery and i was told that ” Recorded Signed For™ items are only tracked after the item has been delivered. Depending on whether the item was sent first or second class, this may be a few days after posting. Please try again later.
Information on your item is not yet available online.”
Whats the point in tracking a parcel after it has already been delivered, i dont need to go online to see if i have recieved my package yet.
Utterly useless.
Chris
12 Sep 06 at 12:09:56
After reading your posts, I could not help but find you all very funny!
Royal Mail has the best first class mail delivering system in the world, you might laugh at it, but you don’t realise is that as soon as the “other” mailing houses start delivering our normal mail, how much fun you going to have fun trying to find out whos delievring your mail and who must I contact to find out. Currently in Germany it will cost you plus minus a poun for a first class stamp! and then first class is like far worse than second, in fact Royal Mail operations are so well streamed lined that second class will be deliver the same time as first clas or a day later! Postcomm has taken Royal Mails Monopoly Protection as, this in the long run will only hurt us the general public and not the “other” mailings house are not interested in normal door-to-door deliveries they only want the money making parts. Have a quick look at DHL’s track & Trace….they have 4 diffrent ones! good luck just tring to find the right one to track it one!
Eugene
23 Sep 06 at 11:09:37
Eugene, thanks for your comments. I have to admit I haven’t got that much first-hand experience of other countries’ mail-delivery systems. But based on what people tell me, I find it hard to believe that we have the best first-class mail delivery system in the world. My personal experience is that at least 25% of first class mail is late (my definition: over 2 days past the day it was sent).
I also believe it’s fundamentally immoral to stop other companies entering the postal market (for much more discussion on this stuff, see my other postings on this blog). It may of course lead to some confusion, particularly if Postcomm continues to interfere, but deregulation in the long run should lead to some innovation in the postal market, if done properly.
andrewferrier
23 Sep 06 at 18:09:27
I am waiting for a recorded letter to be sent to me which contains important documents. It is now 11 days late and I have the usual problems with Royal Mail their website tells me “Not yet delivered come back later” and customer services they just tell you on the phone “it is in transit and will be with you in the next two to three days”. The idea that Recorded Signed For items are only tracked after the item has been delivered is totally useless to me.
I just want to known where my letter is and why it is taking so long to get to me!! The service of Royal Mail is shocking to say the least.
Paul
9 Oct 06 at 20:10:07
Hi,
I worked for Royalmail upto the end of last year. The vast majority of parcels/letters with Special Delivery or Recorded get delivered. Unfortunately when it happens to you, you don’t care about the one’s that suceed. The Recorded product is a bit of a joke and I’m plenty of them do not get signed for. It depends on the delivery office it is being delivered from and how hard they enforce product specification.
Special Delivery is very good and quite cheap compared to other operators, but the problem is the lack of information whilst in transit and information such as which depot it is currently at should be possible.
I am now working for the competition so you are right in the sense that working out who is responsible for what is going to be become more interesting.
Watch this space
Jon
23 Oct 06 at 14:10:36
Jon, thanks for your comments, it’s always good to hear from someone who actually works in the industry. I guess the practical upshot is, send Special Delivery if you care about it (or Fedex it instead).
I will indeed watch this space intently.
andrewferrier
23 Oct 06 at 17:10:32
I used to work in the call centre for the ’service’ you are talking about and it was atrocious. We, as operators would get the blame for undelivered items from customers, when it was actually the fault of post/delivery people who failed to deliver items and Royal Mail for their geriatric computer tracking systems.
Verity
29 Oct 06 at 12:10:38
well i thought i’d fill you guys in with some info, i work at royal mail customer services and royal mail handles 80 million items a day so you’re very lucky to even recieve your letters! basically the customer is either ringing to complain that their mail is being delivered to their neighbour, or that we have lost a package of theirs, and because its first class all we can say is, “im sorry sir but i’m afraid we cannot track items of first class mail so there is no way of finding out if it has been delivered or where it is” its also impossible to get hold of any delivery office by phone. and as for track and trace, we use an inside system that tells us where your parcels are going and they are checked in at every checkpoint, so we get information, but half the time EPODS don’t work so the system is pointless.
thats about it really. royal “fail” in a nutshell
souch13
3 Nov 06 at 23:11:18
Next time you send something to Sweden you can track in on http://www.posten.se and on the first page there you put in the code..
Martin
14 Nov 06 at 23:11:08
I contacted Royal Mail about failure to obtain a signature for an important document. Their response was to give me 6 free Ist Class stamps and recommend that I use Special Delivery. They completely ignored that I pointed out that in their blurb on the receipt for using Track and Trace they say “ideal for items you may need to prove were received,like job applications or legal documents.”
That is except when they don’t bother to obtain a signature! In all I have had at least 5 items for which proof of receipt was unavailable that I know have been delivered because the recipient has confirmed it personally.
I agree it is a very hit and miss system.
Bill
18 Nov 06 at 08:11:13
According to my local post office it is no longer possible to use track and trace with recorded delivery items..
russell
21 Nov 06 at 16:11:25
Yet again Royal Mail Special Delivery tracking is working wonders. Apparently my parcel was delivered at 11am this morning.
It’s now 1pm and nothing has arrived. Royal Mail say it was a mis-scan. Drivers scanning so to not miss targets?
Peter H
30 Nov 06 at 12:11:56
Russell’s local post office is talking nonsense. I’ve checked up on a ‘Recorded Signed For’ as recently as this week and it still works when they’ve bothered to obtain a receipt. The item I checked said they had left a ‘while you were out’ card. So I checked just now and it now says it was delivered on 1st December
Bill
2 Dec 06 at 10:12:20
Hi, I delievered an important manuscript to a publisher exactly four weeks ago using recorded first class mail. (signed for). Today having heard nothing from them for four week, I’ve gone online at royalmail.com and entered my tracking number… it says:
“Recorded Signed For™ items are only tracked after the item has been delivered. Depending on whether the item was sent first or second class, this may be a few days after posting. Please try again later.
Information on your item is not yet available online. ”
-But I sent the item four weeks ago… any ideas? After reading past suggestions here, I guess I’ll phone them up and ask about the EPOD… thanks.
David
7 Dec 06 at 12:12:56
-Ok so I phoned them up and, as expected, they revealled that they have lost my mail.
David
8 Dec 06 at 12:12:50
Commiserations for David, that’s the bit that makes a total mockery of the
“ideal for items you might need to prove were received,like job applications or legal documents.” I wonder if there is a case for false representation? Ideal except when they lose them ?
Just wondering……..
Bill
12 Dec 06 at 19:12:15
ive been waiting since 22nd november for a recorded parcel , royail mail said that the sender has to sort it out but as i bought it of ebay and any1 who uses ebay will no that not all sellers are helpfull. the seller has asked me to sort it out myself. does anyone no what i can do about this cause this is a joke the items where for my daughters christmas… royal mail need to sort it out its a joke.
kellie
13 Dec 06 at 11:12:43
Kellie, seems to me it’s quite clear: your contract is with the seller on Ebay: they paid Royal Mail to deliver the parcel to you. I don’t think Royal Mail are responsible to you here. You should chase the seller and insist that they resolve the problem through Royal Mail or compensate you. If they refuse, you should report them to Ebay.
andrewferrier
13 Dec 06 at 12:12:21
you should try doing this outside royal mail see how you get on and the difference in cost please dont tell me its cheaper or a better service because i have done it and believe me you dont know how lucky you are to have royal mail
anon
19 Dec 06 at 16:12:58
Got the problem with recorded telling me its delivered…and I don’t have it. Just waiting for the ePOD to become available now so I can see who the hell has my xmas pressies.
R
29 Dec 06 at 21:12:03
I have posted my passport out via Special delivery next day guaranteed by 1 pm. 7days after; my post is still in process. After many complains, still no movement. It seems that customer service centre staff do not even care! Finally, I made a further complain to the board of director. I did receive few phone calls afterwards. But they still don’t know where passport is!!
My suggestion is that you should never trust or even use Royal mail when you send important documents! Royal Mail just offer terrible customer service, ridiculous communicate! They just don’t care your post at all!!!
Jane
26 Jan 07 at 13:01:35
Mmmmmm 20 odd disatisfied customers here but I guess many thousands of satisfied ones out there too. If you have a complaint then you are more likely to blog it than someone who thinks the service is great.
Any business that operates on such a massive (and I mean massive!) scale as Royal Mail, will have a percentage of failures but the vast majority of mail gets to its destination safely and on time and a percentage of that that doesn’t is because the item is wrongly addressed or is sent with underpaid postage or is not packaged properly or the the sender never sent it in the first place! Yes I do work for RM and am proud of the service we give.
Next time a TNT or DHL van trundles down your lane to your little cottage in the middle of nowhere ask the driver how he managed to find you. I’m sure he will reply “the postman told me!”
Andy
30 Mar 07 at 23:03:43
Best one I ever had was a signed for the postman delivered but said didn’t need signing for. When i checked the website later it had been signed for by someone else, not me, so how much value can be ascribed to a signature?
All in all Royal mail is pretty good as Eugene says. Like british Rail et all, it only goes to the dogs when Politicians get involved.
CJ
2 Apr 07 at 12:04:59
Jane,
Smae case with me.Royal mail has lost my passport and just the envelope has reached the DVLA office(so they claim).I too have spoken to lot of customer support personnel(whatever that means!!) in both royal mail and dvla but no help.All roayl mail is to make a claim of 32£ and they cannot track my passport.How did u get to talk to the board of director? what u did on your passport? the worst case i need to be travelling overseas shortly as my wife is expecting our baby
AJ
Anonymous
25 Apr 07 at 14:04:07
‘Your item, posted on 21/07/06 with reference xxx has been passed to the overseas postal service for delivery in SWEDEN.’ In other words, Royal Mail have no link to a foreign tracking system, so can’t tell me anything more about it.
OR…… The Swedish Postal Service are unable to provide any further information!
Mark
27 Apr 07 at 16:04:08
I deal with royal mail for everyday 7 days a week and from time to time i do encounter problems with there services. I post parcels and mail from the Post Office Monday to Saturday and sunday i post small items in the post boxes. The royalmail recorded signed for service is useful as it enables me to claim for the item cost if the item is lost. Sometimes royalmail do not update the system or a local delivery office does not pass the barcode sheets back to Head Office where they are scanned online and to the custermer services department. This then means the system tells you that it has not been delivered but with a little bit of effort on the phone and speaking to local delivery offices they can normally tell me who signed for the items. The services they provide are very good to say they handle 80 Million pieces of mail a DAY!
Matthew Atkinson
5 Sep 07 at 20:09:20
I’m from Denmark and have received parcels send from the UK many times. But this is the first time I’m using their track and trace option and this is the answer I get: “Information on your item is not yet available. If the International Signed For® item was posted today please note that the majority of items are tracked during the night. Please try again tomorrow.” Now tomorrow is actually today since it was posted yesterday morning. Compared to the experiences I’ve read above this is still very early, but if I compare it to the Danish similar track and trace service it is very poor. In Denmark the parcel is immediately updated online and you follow it all the way until delivery with updates several times even though it might only take one day for delivery.If my parcel status won’t be updated before after delivery!? then indeed as the headline reads the Royal Mail track and trace seams utterly pointless.
Mads
21 Sep 07 at 11:09:24
I post parcels abroad and within the Uk at least three times per week. If you want to post abroad, always use Airsure. This does offer a track and trace service in this country and abroad. Air Mail and International signed for can only be tracked up to leaving this country.
For the UK I use Special Delivery which is a signed for, either next day by 1pm, or next day by 9am service. I can honestly say that I have had no problems at all with Royal Mail, but did have to ask a number of questions before I started posting a year ago, to ensure I had exactly the right service at the right price.
Even during the current strikes Special Delivery and Airsure are treated as priority and have got through. If theirs anything you’re unsure of and need advice concerning posting Royal Mail Customer Services are (amazingly!) polite and helpful. 08457 740 740
Sarah-Jane
Sarah-Jane
12 Oct 07 at 09:10:14
According to the Royal Mail’s FAQ:
http://www.royalmail.com/portal/rm/content1?mediaId=22700571&catId=400034#13300224
‘We track all Airsure® items until they leave the UK and then the item is handed over to the destination country’s postal service as a priority item.’
I think that’s their euphemism for not tracking items once they leave the country. So I suspect this service suffers from the same problems as I described.
andrewferrier
12 Oct 07 at 11:10:55
I recently brought an item off ebay (a radio scanner) but was faulty
I returned it by recorded delivery 1st class..I checked the track/trace to see that it had been delivered so I contacted the seller who told me that they had not received it..after ringing the royal mail customer service I was told it was signed for and the sig was not the person i had sent it to
anyway I had a email back from customer services to say that they have no evidence that it was not delivered and thay could not help me any further…so now i am £70 out of pocket..the seller told me that was Bull and checked with her neighbors now what do I do?
Thank You
Rikky
15 Oct 07 at 19:10:46
Eugene is talking out of his arse. The mail service in Japan is so good that I still can’t believe how efficient it is after 8 years of living here. They deliver on Sunday’s, if you’re not in and call them, they come round and deliver it within 30 minutes. They trip over themselves to be as polite and helpful as possible and they deliver until 9pm. The Royal Mail is 100% shite in comparison. No strikes here either. For ANY reason. Japan would just replace the lot of them if they even thought about it.
Chris
25 Oct 07 at 02:10:42
I agree with you totally. I sent an important gift overseas, and the company was professional enough to offer me a Royal Mail tracking code. I’ve been refreshing their site for three days now, and it keeps on telling me that “and it is being processed for delivery abroad.”
Why they would need three days I don’t know. Maybe they’re staring at the parcel and trying to will it (Jedi-style) to fly on its own to the destination?
Michael
4 Nov 07 at 22:11:32
i sent a parcel recorded delivery at point of posting i got no reciept now the ebayer saying he not recieved parcel and i got no proof of posting it so no way of tracking it so any idears.
mark smith
12 Nov 07 at 23:11:53
I bought a model from the USA, which was posted via USPS. I received a letter from RM stating that I had to pay £23 VAT plus £8 admin fee(8 BLOODY QUID!!). I sent a cheque to them for £31, and waited excitedly for my parcel to arrive. After a week had passed I had still not received it, so rang the sorting office, to be told that it was still there and had to be collected. After travelling 18 miles to the depot I had to wait nearly an hour for them to find it! When I asked the young lady why, after $35 was paid to have this delivered to my door I ended up having to collect it I was greeted with a shrug!. ROYAL MAIL??? It’s an insult to the coat of arms that it is still allowed to display
Pat
17 Dec 07 at 16:12:00
Royal Mail are a bunch of complacent bastards. I sent a Christmas gift special delivery on 18th (guaranteed to be delivered by 19th); it’s now 22nd and it still hasn’t arrived. The track and trace system spouts its usual crap about the parcel currently being processed and to try again later.
Anyone who has posted on this site defending Royal Mail is unbelievably smug and self-righteous. How can anyone possibly take the side of the business over the consumer? Big deal if they handle 80 million items a day - I can’t believe that this fact is being touted as some kind of miracle. Anyone who cites it is obviously being sucked in by the advertising bullshit of this ridiculous company. The Royal Mail employees who smarmily defend and suck up to their employer obviously get some kind of pathetic ego kick out of being associated with a big (and supposedely high quality) organisation. They spout the compacent company platitudes that are in place to prop up staff morale, not giving one solitary crap about the frustration and grief that incompetent service can cause to the customer. Their posts on this site ought to be removed.
And as for the customers who have posted here to defend RM - well, is it really in your interests to go to the trouble of publicly defending this organisation? Even if you personally have had no problems with their service, you should be at least indifferent in your attitude, and open to the possibility that service has been poor for other people. But to actually defend Royal Mail? Why? Do you actually feel sorry for a large organisation whose directors award themselves huge paychecks ? (the IT director got paid £1 million in 2005; see http://management.silicon.com/itdirector/0,39024673,39130465,00.htm) Do you actually think they need defending? No, it’s we the consumers who need defending, so think twice before you sleep with the enemy.
I hate the way in which companies like Royal Mail blow their own trumpets, boasting about how great their service is when in actual fact, in some respects it can be utter crap. I’d have a lot more respect for them if they were to admit it when they fouled up and to apologise unreservedely, as well as handing out considerable compensations to disappointed customers (i.e. not just six 1st class stamps). Not only should they reimburse the postage costs (and, in the case of lost items, the total cost of the contents of the package, and any postage costs incurred from having to send in a claim form and telephone bill costs from having to speak to their customer services), but also award a bonus payment to customers to compensate for the frustration, disappointment and needless effort expended in their efforts to locate the parcel/letter. That would be a positive gesture. Such compensation costs could easily be met if Royal Mail’s directors were willing to take even a modest pay cut (from their already ridiculously inflated salaries). But, of course, they wouldn’t be, because they’re self-seeking, egotistical low lives.
Steve
22 Dec 07 at 22:12:31
Where do all the missing parcels go??
On 20th Dec, I sent a lady an item she purchased from me thru ebay 1st class recorded delivery; (along with 3 other parcels). The other 3 arrived the next day.
This 1 parcel must have sprouted legs and done a runner…as it still has not been delivered to the addressee, it is not in Royal Mails System apparently, the track and trace service is telling me that no info can be given until a signature is given, nor has the item been returned to me (via the return to sender system (on the back of the parcel)!!
So where do they go?
Does royal mail get burgled often?
Do the employees…feel at the package and think “oo this one is interesting..and smuggle it home in their lunch box”.?
Oh perhaps there is a postal gremlin that steals random packages!! (Just like the washing machine gnome who steals only 1 sock!!)
Or just maybe Royal Mail need to do a bit of house keeping. Not leaving every thing up to machines. Check bins before emptying them into larger waste units. Check machines, and under them to see if any items have been dropped.
H
7 Jan 08 at 20:01:46
I sent some very important legal documents to court via “Track & Trace” last year … 2 weeks later there was no signature recorded and there never has been!
It turned out in the end, the documents were delivered and a signature was never taken. How can this happen??
It took me 3 weeks to determine that the documents were delivered … absolutely pathetic! What on earth is the point of this ridiculous system?!
Mimi
21 Jan 08 at 15:01:04
‘Track and Trace’ isnt the only problem… Get this for an excuse. I sent a letter to client on the 31st October for signed for delivery.
Went through the usual procedure, checked online, item still not delivered, filled out an online claim form and Posted that on the 20th November.
Finally received correspondence from Royal Mail on the 4th January - indicating that they would be sending a letter to the recipient.
Now the best part…. Just recieved a letter back from Royal Mail. Baring in mind this is a signed for item i.e. somoene has to sign for it…
Dear…..
Thanyou for your complaint, I am sorry to hear that we failed to deliver an item of mail addressed to….
Our priority is to provide etc etc
We have written to the person you sent the parcel to, but have not received a reply, SO WE MUST ASSUME THAT WE HAVE DELIVERED THE PACKAGE…..if this is not the case,could you please ask the addressee to confirm this to us…
So royal mail have not got a signature or a record of the arrival but because the recipient did not respond to their enquiry they PRESUME the item was delivered… well is it me or its that the most crazy claim ever…
Well of to go ring the on their 0845 number…as they do not bother responding to email complaints…
Will keep you updated…. sure its going to get worse before getting better.
Alex
23 Jan 08 at 15:01:50
Update:
After a heated argument it appears that the letter above was only to ‘help them’ with an investigation.
Despite me loosing just under £30 because I did not sent the item by special delivery with additional consequential loss cover, regardless that until now this has never been offered to me.. then my claim will only cover the cost of postage…
Well as long as the ‘Peoples’ Post Office make their money I suppose its OK!
Question
Is Royal Mail Track and Trace Pointless
Answer
Yes
Well that me finished…Off to go fill out another Loss form as yet another item has gone missing!!
Alex
23 Jan 08 at 16:01:09
I have had a number of packages sent to me recorded delivery - they have never arrived. But the post office say they have been signed for by me!!!
What do I do in this situation. I reckon the postman has had them but it’s my word against theirs - any suggestions?
Thanks
tom
15 Feb 08 at 12:02:26
So what happens to all this lost mail?
Just reading this blog makes me think that either Royal Mail must have a huge stack of “lost” mail lying in every delivery office, or they have single handedly advanced global warming by burning huge pyres of the stuff.
Really, what conclusion can one reach other than P.O. staff must collectively have tons of mail stashed, because they couldn’t be bothered delivering it.
I’m a cynical public servant!
Alan
25 Feb 08 at 13:02:01
I found these postings because I was looking for a Royal Mail e-mail address. I live in the States, and ordered a vintage bottle of wine from London for my husbands birthday. The wine sellers sent it via Royal Mail, and gave me the tracking number. Every day I check the tracking on Royal Mail’s website, and all it says is, “We have received your item, posted on 28/11/08 and it is being processed for delivery abroad.” And now it’s the 9th of December. I am very frustrated that they’ve held it so long. I’m beging to worry I wont get it ontime for my husbands birthday.
Meredith
9 Dec 08 at 23:12:54