Blog entered 27 November 2014.

                              A HOME GOAL

David Bennett, CEO of Sanctuary Housing, was once described as “the Sir Alex Ferguson of housing”, unquote.

But Sir Alex Ferguson wasn’t a criminal.

Blog entered 12 November 2014.

   ROYAL MAIL OR DICK TURPIN ?

Heard from one of my customers a few days ago who was upset the item I had sent him was being held at the Royal Mail’s Fish Ponds Delivery Office, Bristol. That if he did not pay £9.00 and a £1.00 handling fee the item would remain at the delivery office for the specified time then returned to the sender. The reason given was that “The sender didn’t pay the full postage”.

I then got into a discussion with Royal Mail on Twitter and even sent them a scanned copy of the receipt of payment. Despite this, common sense did not prevail and Royal Mail insisted that the £10.00 must be paid before the item can be collected or re-delivered after which I should then put in a claim to recover the payment, or perhaps more accurately the ‘ransom’.

That Royal Mail was not prepared to simply phone the Bristol Delivery Office and confirm it had seen the receipt and cannot justify withholding or delaying the item a moment longer.

I also take issue with Royal Mail demanding £9.00 when the item actually cost £8.90 to send and that either Royal Mail is willfuly stealing more than it is entitled to or it’s scales at Bristol are producing illegal readings which benefit only Royal Mail. Whichever is the more accurate the Queen’s head and ‘Royal’ patronage should be replaced with that of Dick Turpin.

And if you think 10 pence is a trivial issue consider this : If you send an item of mail which is 10 pence short of the actual cost Royal Mail will demand a £1.00 handling fee from the recipient or withold the item. ‘Recipient’ being a term used by Royal Mail on Twitter to describe unhappy customers who deserve better.

I have now transferred £10.00 to my customer so he can pay the ransom, receive the item and is no longer inconvenienced by Royal Mail. Once the customer has finally received his item I will be seeking an explanation and compensation from Royal Mail.

Royal Mail’s suggestion the postage label must have fallen off does not explain how the item got into the system and as far as Bristol without a label, and is also at odds with the Post Office which processed the item considering Royal Mail’s suggestion as rubbish.