OT - Parcels

Was reading with interest the thread about letter boxes. Moving on from that, I buy quite a lot off stuff from eBay or online stores, and due to everyone being at work in the day, I have to get it sent to my folks house. They're retired, but I'd like to stop this as the postman often get's them out of bed in the mornings.

I have always wondered if there is a service which you can pay for to receive your parcels and you just go and pick them up when you are available. I've looked into getting a P.O. box, but the royal mail state they won't take in packages from other couriers, so it's no use.

Any ideas?

Reply to
Davey
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ISTR a news item recently about a pub offering this service.

Might have been a pub that also hosted the local sub-post-office, or possibly I'm mixing two stories.

Someone will recall, and have a link I'm sure.

Reply to
dom

One of my neighbours has a large wooden box with some locking device on it for his parcels. He works nights though so it's to stop him being woken up.

Add into your address line "leave with neighbour at number 81"?

Ask neighbours to keep an eye out. Ours are pretty good at catching the vans before they disappear and we do the same for other neighbours too. The depots to pick parcels up at are miles away so it's in everyone's interest not to have to trek out.

There is a parcel safe you can buy...

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depends how big your parcels are...

Reply to
mogga

There are plenty of services around that will take in Mail for you and will offer you a "Street Address" . This is but one of them .

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known as "accommodation Addresses"

Having an address different from a credit card address might prove a problem in some cases if buying stuff

Reply to
Usenet Nutter

I think there is a business oppourtunity here, what with the growth in interweb shopping and working spouses.

I were working outside a house last week & watched the postie fail to deliver 3 of 4 packets to various houses. he reckoned it was over 50% failure rate & was getting worse.

There was a company trying to organise a parcel holding service, they had a collection point matching my postcode, but it was right at the other end of the towns.

DHL have gone some way to solving the problem by having part time agents who deliver during the evenings in small local areas.

Reply to
The Medway Handyman

My next door neighbour (from hell) has a sign on his door together with a scanned image of the royal mail logo.

"we are not allowed to accept deliveries for number 7"

Seem's I've upset him ... :-(

Reply to
Adrian C

Post Restante. Standard Royal Mail service.

Andy

Reply to
Andy Champ

Do you get a lot of parcels? ;-)

Reply to
mogga

The problem with other couriers is that (a) we're not allowed to do anything that may be construed as working for the opposition and (b) whoever signs for the parcel could leave themselves wide open, in the event of any damage being discovered later.

PR certainly works, although is rarely used, IME. One problem is that, buying with a credit card, the seller likes the credit card address and delivery address to be the same - even more so, with eBay/Paypal.

One answer is get to know your local sub postmaster, but that is probably not much help if you're in the middle of a large town or city.

Having said that, you can always request redelivery on a day to suit you, such as Saturday.

Reply to
Graeme

Graeme wibbled on Tuesday 10 November 2009 20:51

Sounds like a case of competition being a bad thing. My life would certainly be easier if I have the option for *everything* (OK, excepting 1 ton pallets) to be delivered by Royal Mail/Parcelforce. At least I'd only have to go to one place to collect it - that often being more local than the big courier depots. And I'd have the option for redelivery to a local post office.

Reply to
Tim W

Doesn't work. They won't do it in the town where you live, as I recall.

Reply to
Bob Eager

You may be able to get the credit card co to register a separate delivery address to your account.

Or just change your address to the delivery address and collect your monthly statement from the corner shop.

Owain

Reply to
Owain

I thought that strictly speaking it was intended for use by travellers for a maximum of 3 months duration at any one office.

Owain

Reply to
Owain

In message , Tim W wrote

You've got to be joking. I live in a small village of around 200,000 people and the nearest Parcel Farce depot is 30 miles away.

The local post office is closed when I go to work and closed when I get home.

Reply to
Alan

Neighbours? Can't see any of our neighbours... It's quite funny when we are expecting something and it is being delivered by a courier who doesn't know the area. Two things happen we see a delivery van go flying past then screech to a halt and reverse back up the hill or come back up slowly 5 minutes latter having been down to the village and asked in the Post Office... Many of the common couriers, UPS, DHL, etc have the same driver on the route so they know where all the odd farms and places are. Others drop all the local stuff at one of the towns garages and then a local delivers it. Some is even picked up from the couriers depot and brought in by the returning minibus that took kids to school.

Wouldn't even contemplate going to get something, 50 mile round trip stuff that, they can redeliver on a given date. I suspect many of the drivers don't want to spend the hour coming back out again to redeliver either so stuff gets left in the shed or round the back and a card dropped through the door. Pity that some drivers hand writing makes Gordon Brown's look like block capitals...

Reply to
Dave Liquorice

Most things go Royal Mail rather than ParcelForce (if not delivered by courier). The local delivery office ought to be a lot nearer. My town is a lot smaller than that and the DO is about half a mile away.

Reply to
Bob Eager

Ditto mine. Parcels and letters (Parcelforce + RM) are easy - go to the local sorting office one mile away. Couriers are inevitably miles away in Leeds or similar, which is useless for me.

Reply to
Clive George

Try googling "parcel collection point" don`t know if one has got to market cornering size yet , obvious problem if your MrLocal Corner Shop taking an agency, wher do you stck the stuff.

Cheers Adam

Reply to
Adam Aglionby

Not directly a pick up point , but one that does run on PayPoint shops and HDN doing the shifting:

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Reply to
Adam Aglionby

Is that *really* the ParcelForce depot? One has to distinguish between Royal Mail standard parcels (which typically take 2-4 days) and Parcelforce (which is a full blown courier-like service). They are separate businesses, and PF don't operate out of Royal Mail delivery offices.

As I said, my Royal Mail delivery office is half a mile away (or less). But the PF depot is about 25 miles away.

Reply to
Bob Eager

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