B&Q w***ers.

To finish this saga. B&Q blamed their supplier for not sending the basin. Oddly, I bought it from B&Q, not a 'supplier'. Perhaps they think they are Amazon?

So cancelled it.

After a great deal of looking at local places so I could collect, gave up and found what I wanted on Ebay. Slightly larger (that's OK) but a lot more expensive. Ordered it up.

Arrived quickly. Very nice - just what I wanted in my mind. But had a chip on the back. That wouldn't have mattered as it will be hard to the wall, but extended into a crack on the top which did show - if you looked carefully.

Contacted the seller with pics. They were very sorry and first offered a partial refund. After I refused that, said send it back and they'd replace it. Since I was waiting for it already, I ordered and paid for a second one, which arrived in record time. And was fine.

They then said they'd arrange for the damaged one to be picked up today.

Then got a message saying their carrier wouldn't pick it up due to the weight. And they'd do me a full refund and could I just dispose of it.

I'm not really surprised a carrier wouldn't pick it up due to the size of the box and the weight. Should really have been on a pallet.

I ordered a loo on ebay, ParcelForce delivered it. Smashed to smithereens.

A replacement was sent, ParcelForce lady was having none of me checking it and ####ed off. Smashed to smithereens.

I got in touch with the seller again, they'd send another. I'd put 2 and 2 together at this point, advised them to pack it better as I was guessing that despite turning up at my door with the box on a trolley, the ParcelForce lass who is about 5 stone wet through was prior simply shoving it off the back of the van onto the road!

On the day of the third delivery I did a fair bit of curtain twitching and caught her just in time, "WOULD YOU LIKE A HAND WITH THAT?".

A lot of these things really need two people. As any packing can make it too big for one to handle, even if the weight ain't too bad.

I did have two heavy things delivered on pallets, though. They survived OK.

Apart from te hassle, sounds like a win win. Pop the dmaged one on eBay or maybe a local social media buy/sell page, collection only?

Be a bit cheeky putting it on Ebay. ;-) But yes, Freecycle etc is a good idea.

I'm surprised they employ women to do any serious lifting, HSE have clear guidance that if you want to lift anything heavy to choose a man:

It does make me wonder about equality and diversity if you have a job requirement/spec that requires a lift of 25kg?

Wickes kitchen designer said I needed 4 worktops but I only needed 3. Contacted the designer who said he'd refund and arrange uplift by my fitter. He then phoned the fitter who was at my house. With me listening he told the fitter to dispose of it. I got my refund, stuck it on Gumtree and got another £50 for it. Strange they cant send a van for it and return it to their stock.

Since Parcelforce (and at least some other couriers) have a weight limit of

It wasn't that long ago 50kg/cwt sacks of cement, sand and plaster were the norm.

However did we manage?

Well the thread is about B&Q which once had self service tills in their stores. Often the instruction was to place the 25kg bag of sand/cement/ballast on the scales which were not designed for the safe lifting of such items afterwards.

Beer (to pubs) still comes in containers that when full exceed 25kg. Firkin = 41Litres (approx 0.8 cwt plus the weight of the cask usually aluminium but bloody heavy if stainless steel) Kilderkin = approx 1.6cwt plus the weight of the cask

Also historically wooden Barrels (approx 3cwt liquid) and Hogheads (approx 4.8cwt liquid)- how did we manage?

DPD used to have a two-man team on the round here ... not seen them lately.

The cost of sending a van is about £50 these days anyway.

For many, many years the accepted limit was 1cwt = 112lb ~ 50kg. That's what coal came in and I seem to remember seeing a notice about lifting limits at work when I was an apprentice (1960s) which had similar limits.

It's only in the past few years that our coal man has changed from

... but are people taught how to lift things properly nowadays? It should be one of the things one learns at school or early in an apprenticeship but I doubt if anything so "non academic" even crosses educators minds.

istr the original bags of corn used by the barges weighed 2cwt (224 lbs or 101 kg) each and were all manhandled. No forklifts in those days

well they 'Rolled out the barrel' didn't they

In my hay day I could stand a 45gallon barrel of paint up on its end and maneuver it around balanced on its rim. The trick on standing it up was to get one's whole body across it and heave it away from you

Some managed very well. A significant proportion of us were disabled by back problems, though, and spent the rest of their lives in poverty.