View Full Version : Unbelievable!
Lavenderblue2
13-Aug-07, 16:06
On June 11th my husband posted a business letter containing a substantial cheque to the Highland Council in Wick. He inadvertently put an ordinary 1st class stamp on the letter instead of a large letter stamp.
Today it arrived back to us having been intercepted and opened by the Post Office with a fine to pay of £1.06 – the fine is no big deal but what has incensed me is the fact it has taken the Post Office two months to return this important letter to us.
Of course I will be writing to the Post Office but would this annoy you?
LB[mad]
for goodness sake, yes that would annoy me alot!!!:mad:
I've heard of snail mail Lavenderblue2 but that is really incredible.:~(
Did they not at one time charge the addressee for underpaid postage, when did it change?
On June 11th my husband posted a business letter containing a substantial cheque to the Highland Council in Wick. He inadvertently put an ordinary 1st class stamp on the letter instead of a large letter stamp.
Today it arrived back to us having been intercepted and opened by the Post Office with a fine to pay of £1.06 – the fine is no big deal but what has incensed me is the fact it has taken the Post Office two months to return this important letter to us.
Of course I will be writing to the Post Office but would this annoy you?
LB[mad]
This is the EXACT same thing that has just happened to me with some college work.[evil]
You may find they tried to deliver it to the address on the envelope by sending them a card telling them it has incurred a postage charge and pay the sum. The post office hold it for a period if it is not paid for by the person it was addressed to the post office will then return it to you. But two months seems excessive for this to happen.
my letter was posted on the 18th April and I got it back last Thursday!!!!:eek:
NickInTheNorth
13-Aug-07, 17:09
On June 11th my husband posted a business letter containing a substantial cheque to the Highland Council in Wick. He inadvertently put an ordinary 1st class stamp on the letter instead of a large letter stamp.
Today it arrived back to us having been intercepted and opened by the Post Office with a fine to pay of £1.06 – the fine is no big deal but what has incensed me is the fact it has taken the Post Office two months to return this important letter to us.
Of course I will be writing to the Post Office but would this annoy you?
LB[mad]
I can totally understand your annoyance, and would doubtless feel less than happy too. But I must say that in the same situation the principle target of my annoyance would be myself.
The changes to the rules for posting where clearly publicised. The Royal Mail will of tried to deliver, but if the recipient does not wish to pay for that privilege then rightly they will return it. That has taken 2 months, I don't know the rules on that one I am afraid, and am not really minded to look them up, but it is possibly a bit slow.
However if it is such an important item why was it not send correctly in the first place? Even better send it by a signed for next day service and ensure that you large cheque arrives with the correct person when it should.
Could I also ask LB where it was posted from - do you by any chance live in Wick?
Sorry just noticed you live near Thurso, why not simply hand it in at tyhe council office in Thurso - or Wick. Job done!
Lavenderblue2
13-Aug-07, 17:49
I can totally understand your annoyance, and would doubtless feel less than happy too. But I must say that in the same situation the principle target of my annoyance would be myself.
The changes to the rules for posting where clearly publicised. The Royal Mail will of tried to deliver, but if the recipient does not wish to pay for that privilege then rightly they will return it. That has taken 2 months, I don't know the rules on that one I am afraid, and am not really minded to look them up, but it is possibly a bit slow.
However if it is such an important item why was it not send correctly in the first place? Even better send it by a signed for next day service and ensure that you large cheque arrives with the correct person when it should.
Could I also ask LB where it was posted from - do you by any chance live in Wick?
Sorry just noticed you live near Thurso, why not simply hand it in at tyhe council office in Thurso - or Wick. Job done!
Hindsight is a wonderful thing Nick - being a business we are fully aware of the postal charges - I did say that the wrong stamp was put on the letter inadvertently - we all make mistakes. The letter had to go to Wick therefore it wasn't convenient to hand it in.
LB
j4bberw0ck
13-Aug-07, 19:33
we all make mistakes.......
.........and we all get to pay for them. Sorry, lavenderblue, but the Royal Mail (for it is they, not the Post Office) set out their terms of contract for delivery quite plainly. Break the terms, you pay the price - it's that simple.
And before anyone leaps in about how so much first class mail doesn't meet target times and so Royal Mail breaks its own contracts, the answer's simple; instruct a lawyer and sue for damages.
If you miss being able to get on a bus by 30 seconds and the bus departed on time, it's hardly the bus company's fault, is it?
Big shrug of the shoulders from here I'm afraid!
NickInTheNorth
13-Aug-07, 19:40
Anything that needs to go to Wick can be handed in to Thurso, they forward it in their internal mail system :D
They'll even sign for it if you ask nicely.
Maybe the Royal Mail also made a mistake.
Tubthumper
13-Aug-07, 21:53
Our letter was sent
And God knows where it went
Because what we spent
On the post
Was less than we meant
And in consequent
The letter got bent
It was toast
The lesson we leant
In our confidence dent
Was not excellent
Not the most
And so we’ve been sent
To live in a tent
For council tax dissent
We don’t boast
The Royal mail’s bent
We thought they were meant
To charge or give lent
On poor post
Three months later we’re sent
Words on requirement
Letter went via Gwent
We’re out-grossed
Did they not at one time charge the addressee for underpaid postage, when did it change?I think the addressee is offered the option of paying the excess fee. I would suspect that Councils and large businesses etc. would have a policy of not paying.
Two months to return an item does seem rather excessive though and I can't see that the reason for the item a wrong stamp affixed has any relevance to how quickly the item was returned.
The fact that the new system is a complete botch is that, when I tried to get a second class stamp for a larger sized letter what am I informed, the pen-pushers in the brain-box department responsible didn't have the wit to issue stamps of that value.
It would also appear that for some of the required values it can take as many as five different stamps.
To be honest, if I were in competition with the Royal Mail, I don't think I could have invented a better system to sabotage them.
If the envelope did not have a senders name and address on it, then the letter would be sent to the nearest dead letter office, to try and trace the sender, this could be in Inverness, Aberdeen or even Edinburgh. This may have been the reason for the delay. How many of us put a senders address on our mail? Not me, only on Xmas Cards
Tubthumper
13-Aug-07, 22:31
On Xmas cards? I thought you were a grumpy owld man?
Lavender Blue Dilly Dilly
Lavender Green
Poor old you -Silly Billy
But where had your letter been ??
How annoying to have your letter returned after such a long time !
But we all make mistakes!! The other week I made a few of this very nature.
I had lovingly collected some lavender from my garden, and stuffed it into pretty little bags I had made for that purpose. Then stuck them into envelopes and put a 1st class stamp on each - as I have been doing for years. After some time, a couple of friends rang to tell me they had to pay more than £1 extra, as my stamp was no longer enough ! I was both embarrassed and annoyed, (and could have kicked myself) but my friends were good natured enough to understand.
It appears the thickness / depth of the Lavender Bags no longer fitted a new-fangled machine in the P.O. I usually have my post weighed - but our Main P.O. had been closed for three weeks, followed quickly by our Sub P.O. being closed for almost five weeks - it was not an easy time P.O.wise !
I suppose we have to learn the hard way, but not alone -
We all make mistakes.
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