lost wedding invitations

[mercedes1]

I sent twenty wedding invitations from Oxford to my parents in Spain twenty-four days ago -it was recorded delivery, but they have not received them and the track & trace tool does not provide any useful information on the whereabouts of my parcel. I have been told by Royal Mail customer service to wait until the 4th of March, when they will be considered officially lost. I guess I will have to re-order my invitations, which will be sent late to my guests, and I will have to use some other mail company. This is, obviously, quite embarrassing. What is recorded delivery for? Isn't it supposed to be more secure than standard delivery? Should I have used a different type of delivery? The staff at the post office did not give any advice at the time.

[Sidley]

What information does track and trace give you?

[theboropostie]

The problem most probably is at the Spanish end.

Can you send/post the track and trace number?

Once it leaves Heathrow there is not much Royal Mail can do about it unfortunately.

[IcanthelpthewayIam]

ok recorded delivery is a uk only product, the two international ones that you may have used are:

International Signed for
this service is untracked and Spain isnt on the list of countries that will even advise if it has been received by their mailing system.
This service will(should) provide you with a signature after delivery has been attempted

Airsure
This is a fully tracked service but no signature is obtained on delivery, the track and trace is updated to show when delivery has been made
its also faster than standard airmail

[mercedes1]

The only information I have got from track & trace is that the parcel was posted from Oxford on 2 February 2013. They say that they have my item and that it is being processed for delivery. Given that it was sent almost three weeks ago, I have been told that the invitations are probably lost. The tracking number is LY419912932GB. Royal Mail customer service said that the problem wasn't at the Spanish end: they lost track of the parcel in Oxford.

[mercedes1]

Is there any way I can check whether the parcel made it as far as Heathrow please? Sorry to be a pain, but my mother keeps asking.

[harry84]

Try it at http://www.royalmail.com/trackdetails" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

You get the below:


Date Time Status Track point
02/02/13 16:11 ACCEPTED AT POL 102 - 104 St Ald OX1 1ZZ

My interpretation of this is that it was never (scanned as) collected from the Post Office. The next scans should be Collection and then forwarding on to HWDC from the collection Mail Centre.

LY tracking numbers are Airsure. Do you have the receipt you got when you posted it? If I recall correctly there is a dedicated Airsure team for this product as it is marketed as RM's Premium international product. Either way, someone has dropped a huge clanger somewhere along the line. I'd expect at the very least a refund of your delivery charges.

[mercedes1]

Thank you very much -this is very helpful. I do have the receipt -how can I contact the Airsure team? Does this mean that the invitations might still be in Oxford?

[mercedes1]

Even if I get a refund for the delivery charges, what I really need is getting the invitations back. If I have to re-order them, I will have to pay £80, which is an extra I didn't expect. Is there any way of finding out whether they are still in Oxford? I'm quite happy to come to the post office, collect them, and then find another way of sending them to Spain.

[TeeferTiger]

I don't think you're going to be able to find out where they are I'm afraid. Given the huge amount of items that pass through RM's hands on a daily basis and any number of things that could've happened to them, you won't know unless there's a GPS device in there somewhere!

When you fill in the claim for the lost item, you can put on there how much it was worth. However, if you didn't pay for a service which offered suitable compensation for the item, you'll really only get back what you paid RM to send (lose?!) the item.

[harry84]

Thank you very much -this is very helpful. I do have the receipt -how can I contact the Airsure team? Does this mean that the invitations might still be in Oxford?

No problem.

As far as I know you can contact the Airsure team using the number on the receipt. Or call RM Customer Services on the regular number - I'm pretty sure that if you track the item by phone using the LY number and then ask to be put through to an operator the call *should* be routed to the correct team.

As TeeferTiger says, to be honest your best route is to put in a claim for the item at this point. There's a slim chance it might pop up again or be returned to you (did you put on a return address?) but the reality is you're not going to get Royal Mail carry out any extensive investigations in view of the volume of items in Royal Mail's network.

According to http://www.royalmail.com/personal/inter ... 8-19350045" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Airsure compensation as standard is £ 50. You should be able to claim this back in addition to your postage. Unless, of course you took out the extra compensation.

But I reckon that's as far as you'll get. Basically call Royal Mail and see what they suggest. I'm pretty sure it will be the above though.