RMCtv : We have listened to your feedback regarding the issues delivery colleagues have been experiencing when handling Parcel Collect. 25 is now the maximum number of permitted items.

[BadPostman]

Don't know if its right but i was told when you pay the postage online or on the app, it automatically opts you in for a collection, and you have to tell it you don't need one

[ted_e_bear]

Don't know if its right but i was told when you pay the postage online or on the app, it automatically opts you in for a collection, and you have to tell it you don't need one

Just checked on the app and yes that's correct, it goes straight to "when do you want us to collect" even gives a 2 hour approximate time window which is going to be fun if the duty has to be done differently to accommodate specials, you have to carry on to the next screen to select drop it off instead which costs 16p if it's a post office, (it's free at the DO callers office if you can manage to get there when it's open)

[R5001]

Yep, defaults to collection, every time.

They have recently made it slightly easier to remove it as you go, for ages you could only remove it from the "basket" just before you paid, which was extremely annoying.

[cpsteve]

We do not put labels on so hand them to customer and come back later once they have done so it if its a multi collection.

[rubberbond]

We definitely have multiple unlabelled collections from safe places. They just write the postcode on them so we know which is which. If they don’t have this they don’t get picked up. Simple.

That’s a good way of doing it , but your earlier post about 41 items , that’s just a stupid amount , our van can’t cope with the stuff we have to deliver , without farting about with a stupid amount of collections from people who can’t be bothered to walk 100yards to the post office.

[Barnacle]

I quite often go to collect items and there's nothing to collect, either because....

-They have taken the item to a postbox or post office themselves.
-They cancelled the order.
-It was picked up by another worker on a previous day.
-They accidentally booked a collection when they didn't mean to.
-There's nobody in.

Start charging them and it will stop most of this.

I can understand most of those reasons but the accidentally booking a collection excuse continues to confuse me.

One of the rounds I cover, there’s a particularly difficult address (you have to park on the wrong side of a 60mph road, and you’re right on a blind corner) and they constantly have collections booked in. 90% of the time I go there and the woman says she didn’t mean to book it in. I just don’t get it.

I regularly have collections myself, there’s various pages you have to fill in, you have to enter payment details, confirm their address and your address, what postage you want etc....how can you do all that accidentally?!

As you have booked collections yourself, can you tell me if the process makes it obvious how to select printing a label or getting us to bring a label?
Several times I’ve had a customer think I was bringing a label, then they rebook for the next day and still don’t click to get me to bring a label. So is it not obvious on the app?

[TopperGas]

We do not put labels on so hand them to customer and come back later once they have done so it if its a multi collection.

That can't be done on a rural unless you happen to go past the same address twice. Apart from the odd customer in our DO it seems different customers each week, I can't see many getting hooked and will just stop using the service if we ever do start charging.

[ted_e_bear]

I quite often go to collect items and there's nothing to collect, either because....

-They have taken the item to a postbox or post office themselves.
-They cancelled the order.
-It was picked up by another worker on a previous day.
-They accidentally booked a collection when they didn't mean to.
-There's nobody in.

Start charging them and it will stop most of this.

I can understand most of those reasons but the accidentally booking a collection excuse continues to confuse me.

One of the rounds I cover, there’s a particularly difficult address (you have to park on the wrong side of a 60mph road, and you’re right on a blind corner) and they constantly have collections booked in. 90% of the time I go there and the woman says she didn’t mean to book it in. I just don’t get it.

I regularly have collections myself, there’s various pages you have to fill in, you have to enter payment details, confirm their address and your address, what postage you want etc....how can you do all that accidentally?!

As you have booked collections yourself, can you tell me if the process makes it obvious how to select printing a label or getting us to bring a label?
Several times I’ve had a customer think I was bringing a label, then they rebook for the next day and still don’t click to get me to bring a label. So is it not obvious on the app?

I've just tested buying postage to check and yes it's quite obvious,in fact you have to change it to no if you don't want us to bring a label, might be different if it's an item they're returning though if that's the case, see screenshot

Screenshot_20240317-212103.png

[Barnacle]

I quite often go to collect items and there's nothing to collect, either because....

-They have taken the item to a postbox or post office themselves.
-They cancelled the order.
-It was picked up by another worker on a previous day.
-They accidentally booked a collection when they didn't mean to.
-There's nobody in.

Start charging them and it will stop most of this.

I can understand most of those reasons but the accidentally booking a collection excuse continues to confuse me.

One of the rounds I cover, there’s a particularly difficult address (you have to park on the wrong side of a 60mph road, and you’re right on a blind corner) and they constantly have collections booked in. 90% of the time I go there and the woman says she didn’t mean to book it in. I just don’t get it.

I regularly have collections myself, there’s various pages you have to fill in, you have to enter payment details, confirm their address and your address, what postage you want etc....how can you do all that accidentally?!

As you have booked collections yourself, can you tell me if the process makes it obvious how to select printing a label or getting us to bring a label?
Several times I’ve had a customer think I was bringing a label, then they rebook for the next day and still don’t click to get me to bring a label. So is it not obvious on the app?

I've just tested buying postage to check and yes it's quite obvious,in fact you have to change it to no if you don't want us to bring a label, might be different if it's a return item though if that's the case, see screenshot
Screenshot_20240317-212103.png

Thank you. That is really obvious. Don’t know how they miss it.

[HTPostman]

I quite often go to collect items and there's nothing to collect, either because....

-They have taken the item to a postbox or post office themselves.
-They cancelled the order.
-It was picked up by another worker on a previous day.
-They accidentally booked a collection when they didn't mean to.
-There's nobody in.

Start charging them and it will stop most of this.

I can understand most of those reasons but the accidentally booking a collection excuse continues to confuse me.

One of the rounds I cover, there’s a particularly difficult address (you have to park on the wrong side of a 60mph road, and you’re right on a blind corner) and they constantly have collections booked in. 90% of the time I go there and the woman says she didn’t mean to book it in. I just don’t get it.

I regularly have collections myself, there’s various pages you have to fill in, you have to enter payment details, confirm their address and your address, what postage you want etc....how can you do all that accidentally?!

As you have booked collections yourself, can you tell me if the process makes it obvious how to select printing a label or getting us to bring a label?
Several times I’ve had a customer think I was bringing a label, then they rebook for the next day and still don’t click to get me to bring a label. So is it not obvious on the app?

I've just tested buying postage to check and yes it's quite obvious,in fact you have to change it to no if you don't want us to bring a label, might be different if it's a return item though if that's the case, see screenshot
Screenshot_20240317-212103.png

Thank you. That is really obvious. Don’t know how they miss it.

Thank you ted_e_bear, was just about to say it’s incredibly obvious.

Mind you, I had this scenario recently; someone booked in a collection, with label. When I arrived they said they’ve done an extra parcel because if they’ve booked a collection in we can take extra parcels. All good, no problems there.

Only, they asked if I’d brought the label for the extra parcel. They couldn’t get their head round the fact that you can add extra parcels unannounced but obviously we don’t know there’s extra parcels until we turn up so how can we know to bring extra labels and how do we guess the address to put on the label.

[SMS1969]

If only we didn’t have to deal with people the job would be easier…

[LouBarlow]

We definitely have multiple unlabelled collections from safe places. They just write the postcode on them so we know which is which. If they don’t have this they don’t get picked up. Simple.

That’s a good way of doing it , but your earlier post about 41 items , that’s just a stupid amount , our van can’t cope with the stuff we have to deliver , without farting about with a stupid amount of collections from people who can’t be bothered to walk 100yards to the post office.

Yeah to be fair it isn’t a regular thing. It just happens to be the same customer each time. And they label them, so it is just a case of shifting them into the van. Our regular unlabelled collection is never more than 5, so it is no big deal. If we have a large volume collection we just do it at the end when the van is empty.

[SpacePhoenix]

I wonder what the threshold would be for it to be financially viable to send a van out to do the collections instead of the individual walks. How often do they miss the final run to the local MC?

[Smoothbackground]

I wonder what the threshold would be for it to be financially viable to send a van out to do the collections instead of the individual walks. How often do they miss the final run to the local MC?

I wondered the same thing re sending a van out to do the collections. Perhaps as the collection numbers increase they will have no choice but to do so.

Most Saturdays we have stuff that misses the final MC run and doesn’t go off until Sunday or Monday, though during the week it is very rare.

[Barnacle]

I wonder what the threshold would be for it to be financially viable to send a van out to do the collections instead of the individual walks. How often do they miss the final run to the local MC?

Couple of divisions in our office have trolley walks and there are two drivers, who also do their own walks, who take out the specials and collect the collections on the trolley jobs. So they could simply extend this idea if collections really took off.