Mail not delivered for six months

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I know Teebs has posted this but I suppose the BBC is better late than never.
Mail not delivered for six months

A postman has been suspended for not delivering mail for six months

A postman in Ballyclare has been suspended for not delivering mail for six months.

Royal Mail has said disciplinary proceedings are under way in relation to the matter.

Local businessman Terry Dalzell was among those who did not receive his mail.

He said the first he knew of the problem was when a different postman turned up with all the mail that had been hoarded, including cheques.

"A few weeks ago I was in the office and I heard a noise at the front door and I went out and the postman was there trying to get this rather large plastic bundle of mail through the door," he said.

"He was very apologetic and said to me that there had been some issue with the mail but he suggested I read the letter that was contained inside.

"It was only when I opened the pack up and started to look at the mail that I realised there had been a lot of cheques in there that had been for the business but we hadn't received.

"I was talking to a postman just a day or so after that and asked him if he could confirm that and he said yes there was an issue with a particular postman and that he was hoarding the mail."

Cheques

Mr Dalzell, who works for property management company Gateway NI, said a number of people had contacted the business claiming they had sent cheques.

He said the company's software system automatically generated a letter to customers if it had not received payment for service charges after seven days.

He said the firm was "not sure" if it had received all the cheques they were due.

"There had been people in touch with us that had sent us cheques but we hadn't received, so we just followed our procedures and sent out our reminders and they then confirmed to us that the cheques had been sent," he added.

"Now of course we hadn't heard anything from the Post Office until just a few weeks ago which was six months after the date that they should have arrived. "

He said when the firm received cheques in the post that were late it "automatically returned them to the individuals and explained to them what had happened".

"The individuals have had to send in other new cheques to ourselves to pay for the service charges," he added.

He said the firm had apologised to customers "if they were sending letters out that were causing some concern".

A spokesperson for Royal Mail confirmed that an employee based at Ballyclare Delivery Office had been suspended "in relation to the withholding of mail" and that an investigation into the incident was continuing.

"Royal Mail and its people have a zero tolerance approach to any instances of delaying the mail and work together to ensure that such cases are detected and dealt with as swiftly as possible," the spokesperson said.

"All items recovered by our security team have been delivered but we would ask that anyone with specific concerns contact our customer services team on 08457 740 740."