Parking

[FloralDesigns]

Hello All,

I'm so happy to have found this site as I am looking for some advice please.

We moved to a new home about a year ago, and we've been surprised by our new post woman.

We live on a small, private close of about 15 houses which are mostly semi detached and terraced with about 4 detached bungalows. Walking from one end of the road to the other takes less than 5 mins. Everyone has a drive, and we are extremely lucky to have no parking problems on this road as everyone parks in their drive and no one parks on the road.

So six days per week the post woman drives onto the road at about 40 mph (speed limit is 15) and parks at the first house on the road. She leaves van running, radio blaring and door open whilst she hops out and runs up to the first house. She then runs back to van, slams door and drives to the next house--which is the other side of the semi detached, so less than a second away! She proceeds to drive to each house, park on road outside house, jump out of van, leaving van running, radio blaring and door open to each house on the road until she gets to my house which is about half way down the road--8th house.

When she drives off from my neighbour two doors down, she passes my next door neighbour and speeds up to about 40 mph again and flies into my gravel drive. You can actually hear her put on the breaks and the van skids to a stop right behind my car--or if my car is not there, she skids to a stop all the way up to the fence which is more than half way down the side of my house. Again, she leaves van running, radio blaring and doors open whilst she delivers post to my neighbour and then me (if I have post that day). She then gets back into van, slams door, and flies out of my drive at speed, sending the gravel flying. Reversing back into the road, she has to pull forward again to drive to my neighbour on the other side--parking in the street again in front of each of the remaining houses until she leaves the road-engine reving, tyres screeching. She only drives into my drive, for everyone else she parks in the road in front of their house not even blocking their drive.

It's not the parking in my drive that bothers me so much, although it is annoying when I want to leaving or enter my drive and I have to wait for her to move. But why is she driving house to house on such a small close? Wouldn't it be easier and faster to walk? I've lived on much longer roads and the postmen have always walked and carried 50+ houses worth of post. Sometimes we have another woman or a man deliver here and they walk, so why isn't our regular post woman doing that? The thing that really annoys me though is the speed at which she flies into and out of my drive. My husband and I drive 15 on our road and even less going into our drive. The neighbours all have kids and cats and I would be mortified to hit anything. It seems unnecessary to speed into our drive in particular and I don't like the gravel shooting up at my car. Also, my husband is annoyed at having to constantly rake/sweep the gravel back onto the drive each week from the grass before he mows and where she leaves ruts in the drive where her tyres have dug in. We know it's her doing this because she is the only other person who drives/parks in our drive except us. My husband is away a lot with work, so his car is often not in the drive during the week and I walk most places so my car is often not driven for weeks. (Also, I have CCTV so I know it's her.)

I should also note that we have a drive to the right of our house and to the left of our house is a path to our front door. My husband and I park in our drive, and walk through the back gate to enter the back of our house, we rarely use the front door. The post woman parks in our drive and runs across our front garden to go to the front door which we don't really like as sometimes flowers are trampled--she is the only person we've seen do this ( run across the flower beds instead of walking up footpath). She also drops elastic bands all over the garden and we get two or three wrapped around our post--even if it's just one letter. (Which is not a complaint, just added information.)

Basically, we don't understand why she is driving all the way into our drive and parking. She doesn't seem to do this at any other house. Even if I don't have post, she'll park in my drive to deliver to my neighbour--why not park in neighbour's drive? My neighbour has a circular drive, so the post woman wouldn't even have to reverse out. There is ample space to park in the road outside both our houses. My drive is narrow and only long enough for two cars. It isn't wide enough to have a gate, so I reversed my car to the end of my drive for three weeks to stop her from parking in my drive, but she then pulled up right behind my car--so close you couldn't walk between them. This again seemed silly because there was a whole street to park in and she still had to reverse back away from my car to leave because she'd parked so close. She seems to think she has a right to park in my drive--do Royal Mail have a right to park in private drives if there is ample other parking available?

So what should I do? What can I do? So far, I have tried to ignore it. I don't want to say anything to her or complain for fear of not receiving my post. It seems so strange that she is driving house to house and at this point I'd prefer she not drive into my drive anymore. I don't want to sound 'difficult'--as in 'this is my drive, you can't use it', but I don't like the flying in/out, skidding on the gravel (nearly into my car/fence!) which shoots everywhere. Also, maybe if she parked out front of my house that would also solve the flowers being trampled as she could use the footpath to the door like everyone else. Do you think that's unreasonable?

I would appreciate any help/advice you can offer! Thank you.

[IcanthelpthewayIam]

Best thing to do is just to politely say to her not to park on the drive and to walk on your path

Whether she walks or drives between house is entirely up to her, as for radio blaring again during the day you would have trouble getting environmental health to do anything about it. Leaving the engine running is a big no no, she could get into trouble from her manger for that

As for the excessive speed, I would say going by your description of the street that's actually an exaggeration. Two points on it, the legal speed limit will be whatever the main road is ie 30mph it won't be 15mph. If you are concerned about the speed then approach who ever is in charge of your road maintenance and ask the to install speed bumps

[FloralDesigns]

Dear zx135,

Thank you very much for your reply.

My husband and I have invited three of our neighbours around for tea tomorrow to discuss the post woman's speed and how best to approach this with her (as this is our main concern/complaint). None of us want to offend or cause any sort of animosity (or loose the privilege of having our post delivered to our houses!!). My elderly neighbour said she has seen the post woman driving on our road with her door left open and no seat belt on and this was a concern for her. So that too will be added to the discussion list as I am welcoming other concerns/complaints (instead of just my own).

Something I didn't mention earlier, the post woman also leaves packages on our doorsteps without ringing the bell or knocking (to alert you something is being left) which is annoying, especially when we are waiting home specifically for a delivery--but I'm not sure what the 'rules' are there. Yesterday, she left my 'signed for' package which contained a large £2,500.00 graphics tablet on my front step (which has no cover from the elements). Had the screeching breaks, loud stereo and flying gravel in my drive not alerted me she was here and I needed to check for post, my expensive tablet would have been left out in the rain until the next time I left the house. (I have CCTV footage to show she drove into drive, parked, got out of van with package, ran to my door (through the flower beds!!), put the package on door step, then ran back to van. No attempt to ring bell/knock or otherwise obtain signature.) It worries me to think I might not have been home, and that tablet would have sat on my front step. My neighbour tells me this has happened before to a few other neighbours, so it's something to add to our list for the meeting tomorrow I think.

By-the-way, on a side note, you bring up an interesting point. The road leading to my road is a 40mph road, but upon turning onto my road (private close) there is a 15mph sign. The sign has been there since we moved in, so I don't know who posted it or how enforceable it is (we might also discuss this at the meeting tomorrow along with the possibility of adding speed barriers).

Thank you again for your helpful response. It is much appreciated!

[Lounge Lizard]

The "door left open and no seat belt on" shouldn't be a problem between houses close together but "the post woman also leaves packages on our doorsteps without ringing the bell or knocking (to alert you something is being left) which is annoying" is certainly not acceptable and neither is "screeching breaks, loud stereo and flying gravel in my drive".
It would be best first to speak to her to give the chance of her putting these things right herself. Only if that fails might a proper complaint be necessary.
The 15mph sign is not enforceable.

[Izzy]

If you have cctv footage I would email it to the Royal Mail chief exec. Maybe I am being a bit harsh but a colleague who thinks it is acceptable to compromise road safety, mail/van security, common courtesy, respect for customer property in order to finish quickly is not really such an asset

[FloralDesigns]

Thank you for your reply Lounge Lizard. These past two days we've had a man delivering (by parking his van at end of road and walking door to door--no speeding van, no screeching tyres, no flying gravel, no trampled flowers). So, I haven't had the opportunity to speak to her yet; although, I have no idea what I'll say when I do. I'm concerned how my 'please do not park in my drive' request will go down. I need to find the right words. Occasionally, we get a man or another woman who deliver the post and we always hope that they'll become our new permanent person, but unfortunately the other woman always comes back.

Thank you, Izzy. Yes, we have CCTV footage which has recorded everything from various angles--and she can clearly see the cameras. I think you've hit the key words for me--'common courtesy' 'respect for customer property' 'safety of residents/pedestrians' and perhaps adhering to decent behaviour whilst in company uniform/van. Unfortunately, her behaviour reflects very poorly on the RM which is a shame as not all carriers behave in this manor. I can't imagine even going to a family or friend's house speeding up to enter their drive, slamming on the breaks to come to a skidding halt, trampling their flowers, speeding off so quickly the breaks squeal, etc. let alone exhibiting this behaviour at a stranger/customer's house. It certainly doesn't come across as very professional and I have thought, maybe the company should be told? But you're right, I don't want to seem harsh. The funny thing is, this is behaviour you might expect from your teenage pizza delivery driver or something, not the 50 year old, grey headed post woman!