this post was submitted on 27 Nov 2023
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Over 13million people had an issue with the last parcel they received, according to new research, as a league table of the worst offending firms has also been revealed.

A third of shoppers experienced a problem with a parcel in the last month, either because of late delivery or parcels being left in insecure locations, according to Citizens Advice.

The consumer charity has also published its annual parcel delivery rankings, which shows major parcel firms have delivered a dire service for the third year running.

....

Evri and Yodel came bottom of the parcel table, with an overall score of just 2 stars out of a possible 5, followed closely by DPD with a meagre 2.25 stars.

Royal Mail and Amazon jointly came top, but with just 2.75 stars out of 5.

The top five firms have been measured on their performance on delivery problems - of which Yodel, DPD and Evri are the worst performers - as well as customer service, accessibility and trust.

Royal Mail and Amazon scored 2.6 out of 5 on delivery, followed by DPD with 2 out of 5 and Yodel and Evri both scoring 1.8 out of 5.

...

When it came to customer service, nearly half of consumers said they faced further issues when they tried to resolve a problem with their delivery - for example not getting a response to their complaint.

Amazon's customer service was miles ahead of competitors, scoring 3.6 out of 5, while Royal Mail scored 3. Yodel came bottom with 2.3 out of 5 and also scored the lowest on trust.

...

Four of the five major firms scored 2 stars or below when it came to meeting the needs of disabled customers or individuals who required adjustments to deliveries.

...

Royal Mail came out top with 2.8 out of 5 stars, while Amazon, DPD and Yodel scored 2 out of 5.

Evri scored just 1.6 out of 5 when it came to helping customers with accessibility needs.

top 17 comments
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[–] DeathWearsANecktie@lemm.ee 15 points 9 months ago (3 children)

Hermes thought they could pull the wool over our eyes by rebranding to Evri. They're just the same turd in different packaging.

[–] guriinii@lemmy.world 10 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Evri bit as shit as before

[–] thehatfox@lemmy.world 3 points 9 months ago

Evri parcel gets lost or damaged.

Their service seems to greatly depend on the individual drivers in each area, the driver in my town is great but I've heard it's terrible in some of the surrounding areas.

[–] Emperor 6 points 9 months ago

And Hermes was such a good name too.

[–] Lifebandit666 2 points 9 months ago

Evri is an anagram in of Evil if you change a letter and think they're evil.

[–] butterypowered 8 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Will save a few clocks to the Daily Mail owned This Is Money site:

  • Amazon
  • Royal Mail
  • DPD
  • Yodel
  • Evri (worst)
[–] Emperor 6 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It's almost not worth giving a best and worst as they all did so badly. It's especially disappointing to see the Royal Mail struggling as they always used to be solid and reliable - I wonder what could have happened... 🤔

[–] thehatfox@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Yes, it's pretty poor that none of them managed even a 3 out of 5 overall.

There are quite a few couriers missing though, no Fedex, DHL, DPD Local, Parcelforce, UPS. I wonder how they compare.

[–] Emperor 2 points 9 months ago

I'd guess they do relatively better because they have lower volumes (don't some of them only do large parcels? I haven't encountered them, other than DHL, much and it tended to be big items) and the wheels seem to come off (figuratively, the vans usually look sturdy, although I did drive passed an Amazon driver trying to change two tyres late Saturday - they clearly had had a long day and enough of this BS) when they try and push quantity, often at the cost of quality.

[–] Flax_vert 6 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I feel like it depends on your postie for RM. I've had a great experience with them all the time.

[–] Emperor 4 points 9 months ago

In previous discussions on Reddit it seems to come down to the quality of your individual drivers

Where I am I seem to have a pretty consistent set of drivers who know the patch and people's preferences and I haven't had an issue. So, statistically, there must be some areas where they're all bad, which must be a nightmare.

[–] thehatfox@lemmy.world 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)

For comparison, here is a link to the 2022 league table.

Apparently Royal Mail has gotten worse (2.75 overall down from 3), and Evri despite still being at the bottom of the table has actually improved somewhat (2 overall up from 1.75).

[–] Emperor 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Apparently Royal Mail has gotten worse (2.75 overall down from 3)

They did have that strike at the end of last year.

Evri despite still being at the bottom of the table has actually improved somewhat (2 overall up from 1.75)

At 1.75 it couldn't get much worse unless they started delivering by trebuchet.

[–] DJDarren@thelemmy.club 5 points 9 months ago

delivering by trebuchet.

At least they would fucking deliver.

[–] wiccan2@lemmy.world 3 points 9 months ago
[–] tal@lemmy.today 2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

A third of shoppers experienced a problem with a parcel in the last month, either because of late delivery or parcels being left in insecure locations, according to Citizens Advice.

A third in the last month?

Either package delivery is way, way worse in the UK than in the US, or the phrasing here is designed to get a high numbers. Like, if they had a package stolen in just the last month, that seems like an incomprehensibly-high number. If the question was "did you have a package delivered to a place where someone could have stolen it", that seems like another story.

It looks like Amazon at least has Amazon Locker service in the UK, and I can't imagine that people would be having things delivered to their home at all without requiring a signature at delivery if theft were that high.

EDIT: Is this a third of shoppers that complained to Citizens Advice? Because this sounds like it's not that they're polling a sample of the general population, but that they take in reports from people who have had a problem of some sort:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/dec/06/porch-piracy-wave-of-doorstep-parcel-thefts-sweeping-uk

Got any numbers? Citizens Advice reports 22,787 visits to its lost and stolen parcels webpage last month, 48% up on the previous year.

If so, that'd make a lot more sense, but also make the number much less meaningful.

EDIT2: At least last year, for the entire year, they apparently gathered a number that had about a third of the general population have a package be left in an area where it might be stolen:

https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/about-us/about-us1/media/press-releases/citizens-advice-sounds-the-alarm-on-parcel-delivery-market-as-ten-people-have-parcels-lost-or-stolen-per-minute/

In addition, over 20 million people (38% of all UK adults) have received a ‘Sorry you were out’ card despite being home, resulting in some parcels being left in insecure places like doorsteps and bins.

That I could believe, but that's just leaving the thing at the door where it might be stolen rather than it being stolen, and it's over the course of a year, not a month.

[–] Emperor 2 points 9 months ago

A third in the last month?

Either package delivery is way, way worse in the UK than in the US, or the phrasing here is designed to get a high numbers.

It gives the criteria in the article:

A third of shoppers experienced a problem with a parcel in the last month, either because of late delivery or parcels being left in insecure locations

So, yes, it's very broad.

Given the fact that large parcel volumes mean the delivery drivers have little time to do anything fancy, it's a surprise more people haven't said they had an issue. Amazon, especially, are notorious for not giving their drivers enough time and I often see their parcels just left on the doorstep, which most people wouldn't think us very secure.

I was having a discussion on lateness in the pub at the weekend (the fun we have!) and I am pretty sure companies goose the numbers by setting the date a day over when they can get it to you, so they leave themselves some wiggle room if anything goes wrong. It also, handily, pushes people to use the express delivery option where available.

EDIT: Is this a third of shoppers that complained to Citizens Advice? Because this sounds like it’s not that they’re polling a sample of the general population,

I believe this is a survey done on behalf of Citizens Advice.