13^th February, 2010

Dear Sir,

I writing to make you aware of a complaint I raised with the Post Office earlier today (ref 1-1323626935). I understand that the Post Office and Royal Mail are separate, but hope you will bear with me as the problem I describe affects both companies equally. Specifically, it relates to problems I encountered today while trying to collect a package from a mail order retailer sent using the “Local Collect” service, which I have used before, and without incident until now.

This was the first time I had used the service at this Post Office (252 Shinfield Road, Reading, RG2 8EY). As feared, the staff member I dealt with there (whom I believe to be the postmaster) was utterly confused as to the nature of the service. I was first asked for the address it was delivered to, and she seemed baffled when I informed her it was sent directly to the office and that my home address would not be on the packet. She then neglected to ask for any form of ID, which is required for collection on this service, but did ask for a £1.50 fee after scanning the package into the Post Office till. After pointing out that the label on the packet clearly said NO FEE PAYABLE, she still refused to release the item without taking the fee. I paid, and was issued a receipt which stated “RM Lcl Coll +Fee £1.50”.

On returning home, I called the Post Office help line in what turned out to be the first of three calls to them, and one to Royal Mail’s own help line. I will not bore you with the full details of the polite yet ignorant service given by both the Post Office and Royal Mail staff I spoke to, since their failings were simply down to poor training, for which front line staff are not responsible. However, what I eventually determined is that this entire situation is down to the fact that there are two different (but similar) services called “Local Collect”.

The first is the service that can be used when a customer has missed a package delivery at home, and can re-arrange delivery to their Post Office. This has a £1.50 fee attached, is by far the more commonly used service, and the only one that the majority of Post Office and Royal Mail staff are aware of.

The second is the prepaid service that businesses buy into from Royal Mail, where the package is sent directly to the Post Office for later collection, without a delivery attempt at a home address. This does not attract a fee on collection, and is the service I used. In my experience, very few Post Office or Royal Mail staff even seem to be aware this service exists, and when they are, easily confuse it with the first service due to the identical name.

If I may be frank, having the same name for two different services is a ridiculous situation that is asking for trouble, and failing to properly train both local office and call centre staff is something that only makes matters worse. This is a service that has been offered for several years (I first used it in 2006), and it is inexcusable that retailers using it still warn their customers by email that, and I quote,

“This free service is new to the Post Office and sometimes the branches are not aware of how to deal with these deliveries.”

This warning may have been valid in 2006, but it should not persist today, and so I would like to close with a plea that this problem is addressed thoroughly, and soon. This is not something that needs only the “sticking plaster” approach of a refunded fee. I received various responses today as to whether it was the Post Office or Royal Mail that is responsible for the administration of each type of “Local Collect” service, and so I have forwarded a copy of this letter to the Post Office as well. What is urgently needed here is for the two companies to agree to rename one or the other of these services to prevent the widespread confusion that is present, and the outrageous situation of a Post Office holding packages to ransom for fees that are not applicable, simply because staff do not understand their company’s own services.

Yours faithfully,

Mr James Schlackman