Help!..Lost Special Delivery Reference Number

[retroboy]

Hi all,
Just wondering if anyone could offer some much needed advice.

I sent an letter via "Special Delivery" 4 months ago and have just been informed that it didn't reach the addressee and they claim to have not received the letter.

Unfortunately I seem to have lost the receipt with the reference number on so can't use RM's online tracking system. I know the exact date/ time/ address and which post office it was sent from (just missing the reference number).

Is there ANY way that I can obtain my reference number? (I'm 99% sure that the letter was delivered as I clearly wrote my return address and just need proof it was signed for.)

BTW: it was an application form for the solar panel feed in Tariff which had to be delivered before the deadline so has no "actual" value, however If I can't prove this letter was delivered it'll be a loss of approx £10,000 due to missing the dealine.

Any help/ suggestions much appreciated!

[not me]

speak to the post office

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Custards advice, short and to the point, is the best way to be honest.

Unfortunately the tracking system only records what physically happens to that particular item. What I mean there are no other details except for when it gets accepted at one end of the pipeline, what happens to it as it goes through the system, and a signature at the end of the process. There is no way reverse engineer what the number was from either the sending or receiving address, or from when it first entered the system.

Hopefully if you used a small PO they may be willing to check back on their own records but even then its a very long shot.

It does seem weird though that they say they didn't get it, are they a reputable company.

[Lounge Lizard]

- and must claims be made within three months of posting, or is it six months ?

[retroboy]

Thanks for your replies everyone.

Today I went to the PO where I posted the letter and they said they have no way of finding my reference number even though they only send about 10 Special Deliveries per day. I went to my local sorting office too and they said the same.

The company I sent it to are NPower and it seems they've lost quite a few applications so I'm sure it's not RM's fault. They will honour my application once they have seen evidence via RM's tracking system. Hmnn.. not sure what else to do. How about sending a claim for a lost letter to RM and just hope that someone in the claims dept. can dig it out of the system? (I know the exact date/time it was posted but not sure if this is enough info.)

Thanks again for suggestions/ advice

[not me]

Thanks for your replies everyone.

Today I went to the PO where I posted the letter and they said they have no way of finding my reference number even though they only send about 10 Special Deliveries per day. I went to my local sorting office too and they said the same.

The company I sent it to are NPower and it seems they've lost quite a few applications so I'm sure it's not RM's fault. They will honour my application once they have seen evidence via RM's tracking system. Hmnn.. not sure what else to do. How about sending a claim for a lost letter to RM and just hope that someone in the claims dept. can dig it out of the system? (I know the exact date/time it was posted but not sure if this is enough info.)

Thanks again for suggestions/ advice

they wont even look at a claim with no details

[IcanthelpthewayIam]

Thanks for your replies everyone.

Today I went to the PO where I posted the letter and they said they have no way of finding my reference number even though they only send about 10 Special Deliveries per day. I went to my local sorting office too and they said the same.

The company I sent it to are NPower and it seems they've lost quite a few applications so I'm sure it's not RM's fault. They will honour my application once they have seen evidence via RM's tracking system. Hmnn.. not sure what else to do. How about sending a claim for a lost letter to RM and just hope that someone in the claims dept. can dig it out of the system? (I know the exact date/time it was posted but not sure if this is enough info.)

Thanks again for suggestions/ advice

as custard said they wont be able to help, the only real hope was the post office as they keep a paper copy of the special delivery barcodes used each day, that copy is not on a system that customer services would be able to access it was the post office or nothing im afraid

the only people who could have dug it out of the system were the post office you sent it from, but how long they keep that paper copy of the bar codes is anyones guess, its probably been destroyed by now if its several months old im afraid

[retroboy]

I miss the days when you'd get a nice big silver receipt with Special Delivery. I think I bunged my receipt away assuming it was one from Tesco or similar.

Oh well live and learn

[Caniel]

I refuse the believe there is no way of finding out what has happened.

The guy knows the date and time it was posted so that means it would have had to arrive the following day or the day after that if it was posted really late in the day. Unless it's a Friday in which case it could be the Monday.

Armed with the address of the sender and the address it was going to which I would assume would be a firms bulk delivery since it's NPower done by a driver using a PDA it should be possible to retrieve the list of items signed for on that walk on those two days. Then it's a matter of trawling through the tracking numbers that are Special Delivery ones and seeing if a senders address matches the one for the original poster.

[Lounge Lizard]

Thanks for your replies everyone.

Today I went to the PO where I posted the letter and they said they have no way of finding my reference number even though they only send about 10 Special Deliveries per day. I went to my local sorting office too and they said the same.

The company I sent it to are NPower and it seems they've lost quite a few applications so I'm sure it's not RM's fault. They will honour my application once they have seen evidence via RM's tracking system. Hmnn.. not sure what else to do. How about sending a claim for a lost letter to RM and just hope that someone in the claims dept. can dig it out of the system? (I know the exact date/time it was posted but not sure if this is enough info.)

Thanks again for suggestions/ advice

Sorry, but my experience is that you can't reason with NPower even if you do have tracking number and everything else.
Took me two years and the Energy Ombudsman finding against them to get things resolved.

[IcanthelpthewayIam]

I refuse the believe there is no way of finding out what has happened.

The guy knows the date and time it was posted so that means it would have had to arrive the following day or the day after that if it was posted really late in the day. Unless it's a Friday in which case it could be the Monday.

Armed with the address of the sender and the address it was going to which I would assume would be a firms bulk delivery since it's NPower done by a driver using a PDA it should be possible to retrieve the list of items signed for on that walk on those two days. Then it's a matter of trawling through the tracking numbers that are Special Delivery ones and seeing if a senders address matches the one for the original poster.

senders details are not stored anwhere on the track and trace system, as has been said the tracking number could be found by the sending post office as they produce a list of barcodes they dispatch each day but if they are not willing or they have destroyed them then sender is not onto much luck unfortunately

[Caniel]

I refuse the believe there is no way of finding out what has happened.

The guy knows the date and time it was posted so that means it would have had to arrive the following day or the day after that if it was posted really late in the day. Unless it's a Friday in which case it could be the Monday.

Armed with the address of the sender and the address it was going to which I would assume would be a firms bulk delivery since it's NPower done by a driver using a PDA it should be possible to retrieve the list of items signed for on that walk on those two days. Then it's a matter of trawling through the tracking numbers that are Special Delivery ones and seeing if a senders address matches the one for the original poster.

senders details are not stored anwhere on the track and trace system, as has been said the tracking number could be found by the sending post office as they produce a list of barcodes they dispatch each day but if they are not willing or they have destroyed them then sender is not onto much luck unfortunately

The track and trace system will at least show the post office it originated from, given the very small time frame of 1 or 2 days I find it highly unlikely that there would be more than 1 Special posted to Npower from that Post Office at that time. This can be done it just requires someone with the ability or authority to pull the PDA records for that delivery duty on that day and to check the Special Delivery tracking numbers on the track and trace to see if there is a match. Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't the audit trail on the intra site show the senders address? I know the track and trace on the website doesn't. It's been a while since I used the intra sites track and trace and from what I remember the audit trail on there was a lot more detailed especially with Special Deliveries. Another thing, last time I posted a Special I was sure the counters lady typed my address in, why would she do that if it wasn't going on the audit trail?

The only problem I can see is that at best it will prove that someone posted a Special Delivery from that Post Office to NPower, without the proof of postage receipt the sender cannot really prove it was them that sent it. It's better than nothing tho, regardless it will show Npower have it and might force them to find it or accept liability.

[IcanthelpthewayIam]

I refuse the believe there is no way of finding out what has happened.

The guy knows the date and time it was posted so that means it would have had to arrive the following day or the day after that if it was posted really late in the day. Unless it's a Friday in which case it could be the Monday.

Armed with the address of the sender and the address it was going to which I would assume would be a firms bulk delivery since it's NPower done by a driver using a PDA it should be possible to retrieve the list of items signed for on that walk on those two days. Then it's a matter of trawling through the tracking numbers that are Special Delivery ones and seeing if a senders address matches the one for the original poster.

senders details are not stored anwhere on the track and trace system, as has been said the tracking number could be found by the sending post office as they produce a list of barcodes they dispatch each day but if they are not willing or they have destroyed them then sender is not onto much luck unfortunately

The track and trace system will at least show the post office it originated from, given the very small time frame of 1 or 2 days I find it highly unlikely that there would be more than 1 Special posted to Npower from that Post Office at that time. This can be done it just requires someone with the ability or authority to pull the PDA records for that delivery duty on that day and to check the Special Delivery tracking numbers on the track and trace to see if there is a match. Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't the audit trail on the intra site show the senders address? I know the track and trace on the website doesn't. It's been a while since I used the intra sites track and trace and from what I remember the audit trail on there was a lot more detailed especially with Special Deliveries. Another thing, last time I posted a Special I was sure the counters lady typed my address in, why would she do that if it wasn't going on the audit trail?

The only problem I can see is that at best it will prove that someone posted a Special Delivery from that Post Office to NPower, without the proof of postage receipt the sender cannot really prove it was them that sent it. It's better than nothing tho, regardless it will show Npower have it and might force them to find it or accept liability.

the audit trail only shows the senders address for tracked items not specials etc, they are not inputed into horizon at the counter, and it doesnt always show the sending post office, the problem you would have for pulling the pda records chances are it may be difficult to find which pda was used on that day or which user was delivering to npower that day, remember its from 3 months ago at least, Npower i would imagine were getting a very large number of specials at this time, it was a cut off date where people would save a very large amount of money so the number of specials i would imagine would be fairly high, also other factor like Npower may have had a business divert in place at that time for these correspondance so might not even be the correct do with the post code customer sent item to, yes it may be possible but would be very time comsuming and might not even work

[Caniel]

I refuse the believe there is no way of finding out what has happened.

The guy knows the date and time it was posted so that means it would have had to arrive the following day or the day after that if it was posted really late in the day. Unless it's a Friday in which case it could be the Monday.

Armed with the address of the sender and the address it was going to which I would assume would be a firms bulk delivery since it's NPower done by a driver using a PDA it should be possible to retrieve the list of items signed for on that walk on those two days. Then it's a matter of trawling through the tracking numbers that are Special Delivery ones and seeing if a senders address matches the one for the original poster.

senders details are not stored anwhere on the track and trace system, as has been said the tracking number could be found by the sending post office as they produce a list of barcodes they dispatch each day but if they are not willing or they have destroyed them then sender is not onto much luck unfortunately

The track and trace system will at least show the post office it originated from, given the very small time frame of 1 or 2 days I find it highly unlikely that there would be more than 1 Special posted to Npower from that Post Office at that time. This can be done it just requires someone with the ability or authority to pull the PDA records for that delivery duty on that day and to check the Special Delivery tracking numbers on the track and trace to see if there is a match. Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't the audit trail on the intra site show the senders address? I know the track and trace on the website doesn't. It's been a while since I used the intra sites track and trace and from what I remember the audit trail on there was a lot more detailed especially with Special Deliveries. Another thing, last time I posted a Special I was sure the counters lady typed my address in, why would she do that if it wasn't going on the audit trail?

The only problem I can see is that at best it will prove that someone posted a Special Delivery from that Post Office to NPower, without the proof of postage receipt the sender cannot really prove it was them that sent it. It's better than nothing tho, regardless it will show Npower have it and might force them to find it or accept liability.

the audit trail only shows the senders address for tracked items not specials etc, they are not inputed into horizon at the counter, and it doesnt always show the sending post office, the problem you would have for pulling the pda records chances are it may be difficult to find which pda was used on that day or which user was delivering to npower that day, remember its from 3 months ago at least, Npower i would imagine were getting a very large number of specials at this time, it was a cut off date where people would save a very large amount of money so the number of specials i would imagine would be fairly high, also other factor like Npower may have had a business divert in place at that time for these correspondance so might not even be the correct do with the post code customer sent item to, yes it may be possible but would be very time comsuming and might not even work

Which pda was in use is irrelevant, it would be who was logged in on that day and on that delivery which would matter. I can't say for other offices but it would take about 2 minutes to find out who was on what delivery 4 months ago at my office and we have about 150 deliveries. From that it shouldn't be hard or time consuming to find the records of what was signed for on that day on that walk, eliminate all the tracked and recorded delivery codes from the list and work your way through special codes until you find a match. If there's a business divert in place you just do the same procedure at the DO which delivers to the forwarding address.

Yes it might not work and there may be other factors like the data is lost/corrupted for some reason, the track and trace could be incomplete etc but it's far from impossible and it's not an awful lot to ask someone with the clout to pull the data off the system and check it. Giving a s**t about people's mail after all is what's supposed to set us apart from the competition.

[retroboy]

Thanks for the insightful comments :)

I just can't fathom how it's not available to SOMEONE at RM in the right department.
Unfortunatly I think the RM's stance on this is that if you lose the receipt it's game over. I should've used a more premium service for such important documents such as a courier company and will do so in the future.

The frustrating thing is knowing that right now on RM's track and trace system is an online copy of exactly what I need...just that I just can't access it!

cheers for all replies