Use of Twitter to let customers know where you are

[wiganpostie]

I think it would be a great idea if we used hedgehogs on delivery. There was one in my garden the other night and I counted its spines, and guess what, it's got 632 which is the exact same number as the delivery points on my duty. We could impale the mail for each house on a unique spike and gaffer tape the hedgehog to the back of a small remote control car that would be controlled by a specially modified mobile phone paid for by Royal Mail. Any packets that were too large for the hedgehogs spines we would cram up its arse.

[mazza111]

Nice, we don't agree with him, now we're all arrogant and rude

[not me]

Muzzy...without going into the flaws too much and there are one or two ...they won't even give us a cheap basic mobile to phone the office with so wtf are we going to be tweeting/twittering/whatever on?

You dont own a mobile? Wow, how do you phone in specials not delivered?

You can actually use twitter via text messages

using my supplied RM phone
oh wait.........

[sidewinder]

Daft idea. I never had time to stop for a fag let alone play with a phone.

[NewPostieUK]

Brilliant idea.

I can't wait to have my duty halved to give me time to piss about on a phone.

Pity I can never get a signal when I need one.

[sidewinder]

Brilliant idea.

I can't wait to have my duty halved to give me time to piss about on a phone.

Pity I can never get a signal when I need one.

Yep!!! Wilful delay of a tweet.
I'll get my coat.....

[NewPostieUK]

Do you not phone in non delivery of specials then or do you claim back 10p each time?

It only costs 10p to make a phone call? Which network do you use?

I don't inform my office of undelivered Specials. They just need to look at the card I give them the next day to see whats been delivered and what hasn't.

[Redyam]

Interesting idea, although it would have to be very automated to work, I.e. You click a button when you are going out, and it updates twitter with the automated times, and estimates timings for recordeds and specials. These timings would work from details obtained from the postman and georoute.

It would have to be put into the pda's, so for example you scan a barcode and it then automatically updates twitter. This needs big royal mail input, and a change of the software.

Pros: very customer focused, and would improve customer relations.
Good if you are on the same round and know your customers.
Specials/ recs easier to get rid of.
Easier than text messaging.


Cons: who would pay for the phone, data using, time spent twittering? If royal mail then fine, but anything rm implements is slower than a glacier, and all they are focused on at the moment is cutting costs.

Security: if you just tweeted on an open network that the special delivery was just undelivered and hence you are walking done the street with it, people will know... Mugging hazard. Maybe a secure twitter account?

Takes a lot of time up to twitter people, royal mail would see this as wasted time?

Might get tedious if not done right.

Training staff? I know some rm people that have never used a computer.

[NewPostieUK]

Cons: Everyone is at work, so there will be nobody to read the tweets.

[pickaname]

Its bollocks.

lets move on

[zidangus]

Maybe a better idea would be RM send an automated text to recorded and special delivery customers, when their postman has left the office. This could be maybe done by scanning the barcode and the price of this included in the charge for the service (recorded or special). They could also include in the text a rough estimate of what time their postman would reach their street. I mean I have a rough idea as to what time I am going to get to each street I am delivering to, so that would not be hard for RM to estimate for each walk. If anything it would be a good reminder for people to be in the house for a given time when we have recorded or specials (especially on the weekend when people are not at work).

[Stormproof]

Maybe a better idea would be RM send an automated text to recorded and special delivery customers, when their postman has left the office. This could be maybe done by scanning the barcode and the price of this included in the charge for the service (recorded or special). They could also include in the text a rough estimate of what time their postman would reach their street. I mean I have a rough idea as to what time I am going to get to each street I am delivering to, so that would not be hard for RM to estimate for each walk.

I have a rough idea when I'm going to get to customers with Specials.............before 1pm

[fishtank]

I phoned up Sky for an engineer once and they told me next tuesday.
I asked for a rough estimate of the time and the CSR said yes....next tuesday.

[zidangus]

Maybe a better idea would be RM send an automated text to recorded and special delivery customers, when their postman has left the office. This could be maybe done by scanning the barcode and the price of this included in the charge for the service (recorded or special). They could also include in the text a rough estimate of what time their postman would reach their street. I mean I have a rough idea as to what time I am going to get to each street I am delivering to, so that would not be hard for RM to estimate for each walk.

I have a rough idea when I'm going to get to customers with Specials.............before 1pm

Whats the errors on your estimate, mine are usually plus minus 2 hours

[Postman Plodd]

You know for a fact that folk who NEED to go out prior to the post arriving would be scouring the streets to argue with you as to why they cant have their post on the street. Plus you can also imagine the protracted debates as to why you cant 'just nip off your usual route, it'll only take you 5 minutes' to deliver to someone who cant wait at the other end of your walk.