Special delivery next day before 1 PM - lost passport

[campers]

Hello

I'm trying to get this headache sorted , as it seems no one cares about the grief its been caused to me .
I was meant to have my baby's passport delivered from the consulate , was sent next day before 1 PM , service wich i paid for .

I never knew when its gonna be sent , so i couldn't actually track it . But when i enquired on the date of 12 february , i been told its been delivered on 7th of january . The day i put all the papers trough for it was 17 dec , and i been told i should wait for it until end of january .

Now RM did admit they did a mistake ( wich it happens , i do mistakes at work , everyone does , so not upset cause of this ) , and even though it was tracked and everything , they delivered it to a different house and a different name .
The passport set me back somewhere between £300 to £500 ( if i include the fact i had to take holiday 2 days to be able to drive from castleford to edinburgh , with my baby , as i can't really drive more then a few hours before baby goes crazy ) , which i would've been happy with at first if i would've been refunded that , but its almost a month now since i keep trying to get my money back and it seems they dont wanna take any liablity .
They keep insisting that its the sender that should ask for compensation , while on their website it says clearly that it can both sender and recipient can claim , its just if both of them gonna do it , it will be the sender that gets compensation .

Now the consulate told us that it's none of their bussiness what RM is doing , and they dont wanna take part in the story / apply for compensation .

What to do to get my compensation ? Anyone knows if i can claim money for the hassle and headache and the fact that they trying to get away with it ? As i surely feel i would be entitled to and i don't get it how they can be so careless when causing so much grief .
We are EU citizens , and we need that passport to be able to get pressetle status for our baby before 1st june , when the deadline is .
We waited for the appointment that we had in december for a few months . If same thing gonna happen now , we will be in a trouble and surely will be a lot more hassle to work things out .
Not to remember about all the other aspects - having to drive there , exposing ourself to virus and possible car accidents on the way , our current car is not the most reliable and so on . ( baby crying if driving more then 1-2 hours - it was a experience i was hoping i'm not gonna have to live it anytime soon )
We wanted to go see our families (wich they havent even met the baby yet , even though he's 9 months old now ) as soon as restrictions where being lifted . Not likely now ... :(

I mean , many of these things can't even be bought with money , yet they refuse to pay for their mistakes . :(

Any advice ?

[Snaggletooth]

Yes, normally either the sender or recipient can claim, although it is always recommended that the sender claims.

Royal Mail are legally obliged to send a piece of mail to the address written on the item (but not the name written on it: that isn't part of the rules). If a parcel ends up at the wrong address, it could be the customer's fault (i.e. the consulate wrote the wrong address on the envelope) or it could be RM's fault (i.e. they delivered to a different address to the one written on the envelope). This information is not necessarily input into the system when sending, particularly if the customer used PPI to pay for their mail, which is common for customers of the size of a consulate. So Royal Mail will want proof of the address that was written on the envelope, which probably means the proof of posting docket that the consulate should hold.

The other issue is that most of the costs you mention would only be refundable by Royal Mail if it is their fault and the customer (i.e. the consulate) paid for Consequential Loss insurance, which is an add on to the normal service. Again, depending on how the consulate sent it, the only proof that this was paid for may be the the paperwork that the consulate prepared when sending the letter.

So the question is: if the consulate are not willing to put in the claim for this, have they sent you the proof of posting docket (and possibly the docket showing they paid for the service) that proves that it wasn't the consulate's fault, and therefore allows you to claim from Royal Mail? This is the generally the minimum level of proof that is needed to make a claim, whether the claim is made by the sender or the recipient.

[campers]

It was us that wrote the adress on a blank grey plastic envelope , so a mistake of that nature is impossible . The same envelope they put the passport in and then sent it towards us . It did got to the local sorting warehouse , so it was delivered somewhere localy . They did went back to where its been delivered a month after ( just when we found out) and the person that received it by mistake said it sent it back to consulate . Consulate didnt received it though .


That doesn't makes sense - it says signed for , so it surely has to be handed over to the right person ?

No , they haven't sent me any proof of posting docket (docket = document ? ) . I havent asked for it , yet , as i didn't knew what i need and no one told me whats needed . Probably by now they dont have it no more . Maybe this was RM strategy ? to try and gain time till evidence being lost ?
I been told that , locally , before , that cause they don't have the envelope , they wouldnt know that we wrote the right adress on it .

It's just incredible of such an item being lost and i have to take both hits , financial and headache too .

So you're saying that , even in best case scenario , probably i will be entitled to what passport costs ( £55) and thats it ? It's not even worth the hassle then , it costs me more then that just in petrol to get to edinburgh , and at the minute car is not working properly , it has no heating . + accomodation for a night , food , cost of the appointment and all that . ( just what whe had to do first time aswell ) .

I would've thought they would need to pay for the damage they caused ?

If i get the posting document , would it worth putting this trough small court and asking for stupid compensation , with a no-win no-fee lawyer ?

thanks for your reply :)

[Snaggletooth]

So you're saying that , even in best case scenario , probably i will be entitled to what passport costs ( £55) and that's it?

It depends if you or the consulate paid for the extra Consequential Loss cover or not.