Lost certificates between Garstang and Liverpool

HannahsMum · Post by **HannahsMum** » 20 Dec 2019, 18:33

Hi All,
Before anyone says it, I know I should have posted by registered post. The truth is, my daughter took her own life in January and I'm not thinking very straight anymore.
The A4 letter was posted in Garstang in early November and contained the pension forms for my daughters children to receive their mum's Civil Service pension, also both of their original birth certificates and my daughters death certificate. The address they were going to was Civil Service Pensions, PO Box 2017 Liverpool, L69 2BU. It's entirely possible that I forgot to write the address on the envelope but I'm not sure. I know birth certificates can be replaced, unlike daughters, but it's just another worry. I'm frightened that they may get into the wrong hands even though I've rung the Pension office and let them know. Any advice or help would really be appreciated at the moment.

Thank you
Louise

Post by **TrueBlueTerrier** » 21 Dec 2019, 08:36

If you did forget to put the address on or the envelope was damaged in some way then there is the chance they got posted to the Returns letter branch which is based in Belfast. If so then give Royal Mail a call as soon as you can probably Monday morning describe the details of the certificates to them and they will send the details to the RLB and hopefully find and reunite you with them.

Post by **Snaggletooth** » 21 Dec 2019, 08:45

If you were my customer I would have advised you not to use Special Delivery, assuming that all the documents are British, because they are easy to replace.

There is no certainty that RM will find your item, or find it quickly, so I would advise completing a new form for Civil Service Pensions. Your local Register Office can help you obtain replacement certificates, regardless of whether the registrations happened in your district or not.

Good luck.

HannahsMum · Post by **HannahsMum** » 21 Dec 2019, 13:59

Thank you for your suggestions, I will call Belfast and maybe due to the time of year there's a back log of returns. Here's hoping I eventually get the certificates back.
Thank you
Louise

yellowbelly · Post by **yellowbelly** » 22 Dec 2019, 15:20

Snaggletooth wrote:If you were my customer I would have advised you not to use Special Delivery, assuming that all the documents are British, because they are easy to replace.

Snaggletooth - understand your point but don't agree with your advice - what price the additional stress and time that the OP is going
to have to spend raising a lost item request and obtain new certificates? Sometimes SD is not about the monetary value of the items but
the level of certainty it should provide.

Cost of replacement birth certificates is £11 each from what I can see on the gov.uk website.

Cost of 500g SD letter would have been £7.40

Best wishes to the OP.

Post by **Snaggletooth** » 22 Dec 2019, 18:20

I was trying to reassure the first poster that it isn’t a given that she should have used SD. She seems to be beating herself up over that decision, when she shouldn’t be.

The standard counter conversation is based on four objective questions: “when do you need it to get there”, “ what is inside”, “how much is it worth” and “do you need to prove that it got there”. The advice given is also objective, based on matching the answers to the features of the services. In this case, the objective answer would be first or second class, possibly with Signed For added on. If the customer then wants to upgrade to SD for their own piece of mind we wouldn’t object, but to advise the use of SD for that reason only is mis-selling.

I always had this conversation at the Post Office counter, so the customer always walked away with at least a Certificate of Posting. I would not advocate posting such an item in a post box, because of the difficultly of making a claim.

The above only applies to British birth, death & marriage certificates. As soon as you get into, say, foreign issued documents then the item should definitely go by SD.