Delivery of Precious Metals From The Royal Mint (and others) by DHL (and others) - Feedback & Horror Stories

[BackyardBullion]

So, was going to write this in another thread but thought actually this deserves its own thread here on the Forum.

FEEDBACK IS SO IMPORTANT

If we let The Royal Mint (and other providers know) that very valuable packages are being left on doorsteps without checking people are home or thrown over gates (as @goldhunter mentioned!) Then we can effect change. 

I have fed this back to The Royal Mint who have assured me that they will be raising it with DHL, their courier of choice for high value items. 

My story is as follows:

• Got dispatch notification from Royal Mint & DHL about a package.
• Delivery day was one I was going to be away, so I went on the DHL website and rearranged delivery for the next week when I would be back.
• "Delivery" happened on the day I was away. 
• I checked the proof of delivery and a £2000 package was just left on my doorstep....
• Tried for the better part of 30 minutes to get in touch with DHL but they have only a tracking service phone number, no centralised customer service number. 
• Eventually found a 0845 number for DHL and phoned them (this 12 minute call cost me £10 by the way, thats another rant in it's own right)
• Told the driver would return and retrieve parcel. 
• Finally got through on the Whatsapp customer service messaging 4 hours later for update, still nothing had been done. 
• Escalated this to a formal complaint and by 6pm the package had been retrieved. 
• It had been sat on my doorstep for the better part of 6 hours. 
• Thank god it was still there. 
• Complaint upheld by DHL, they refunded me the £10 cost of the phone call to them.
• Shambles.
• Feedback any horror stories you have to The Royal Mint because they need to know!

Rant over. 

Sorry!

[Rll1288]

What a crazy situation...... At least with RM SD if it can't be delivered they take it away and let you know.. How can someone like DHL not have the same principle. Unless its because the drivers get paid on the number of drops they make without returns 🙂

[BackyardBullion]

The craziest thing is...

If it is stolen, the best you can hope for is a refund from The Royal Mint. 

They cannot replace/remint something that has been stolen because reminting it will increase the overall mintage. 

[Fivepoundfred]

I have purchased a couple of coins recently that were shipped with DHL express. Had the initial email notification followed shortly after by further emails trying to prompt me to accept delivery without signature, or in other words accept a leave it on the doorstep delivery.

Not sure if they actually know of the value of contents of a parcel, probably not !

 

[modofantasma]

😬😬

[Rll1288]

I know the Gothic Crown is supposed to hit the heights... but the roof?

[Lyrinn]

My favourite "incident" was when I once took the day off work to be in for a parcel from The Royal Mint.

The long of the short is that my office space adjoins my lounge, which has a door that leads to my porch. I can pretty much see when the postie, or postal delivery service staff, come to my door when I am sat at my desk. This also means that, unless I am suddenly rendered deaf, or the doorbell magically stops working, I can hear when someone is at the door via knocking or the doorbell.

So, you can imagine my surprise when, on this day (which was actually this year), I get an email from the courier service informing me that my parcel has been successfully delivered. I thought this was most strange, as, upon inspection of the email as to who signed for my parcel (because it has to be signed for), was a name that I didn't recognise. In fact, this name didn't belong to anyone in the street that I live. I had wondered if they had been lazy and just dumped it to either side of the porch. Upon inspection, however, this wasn't so. At this point, you can understand why I was concerned. The Royal Mint would say that the courier had delivered it, and the courier would claim that it had been signed for. I tried to ask the neighbours, but no-body was in. This surprised me, as it couldn't have been more than 5 minutes since the parcel had been delivered, if I was to believe the email I had been given.

Long story short, it turned out that it had been delivered to one of my neighbours (so, the wrong address) who was then taking a shower and had given them a false name (why, I don't know). They posted the parcel through my letterbox about an hour later, when I was in the queue of people wanting to talk to the courier service team.

What a day it was.

Part of me actually wants to go back and experience the joy of having the parcel properly delivered to me by my neighbour. The rest of (and far more sensible part of me) never wants to experience it ever again.

[blackadder]

Making up fees on packages is another great one,£15 £20 custom fees on a £10 item etc etc..law onto themselves lol

 

[James32]

9 minutes ago, Lyrinn said:

 

Part of me actually wants to go back and experience the joy of having the parcel properly delivered to me by my neighbour. The rest of (and far more sensible part of me) never wants to experience it ever again.

Yeah I'd be happy with my neighbour delivering my parcels when in the middle of having  a shower too.....don't judge as John is a looker 🙈

[BackyardBullion]

Hilariously, today I have had multiple deliveries and so far they have come from:

DHL

FexEx

UPS

Royal Mail

Hermes

And Mrs BYB has just informed me that she is expecting something from DPD today too!

That's 6 separate delivery companies in one day!
 

 

[GoldStatue]

1 hour ago, blackadder said:

Making up fees on packages is another great one,£15 £20 custom fees on a £10 item etc etc..law onto themselves lol

 

That drives me crazy as well, it also seems a bit of a lottery whether you get charged customs in the first place.

I've been in a situation when the courier has a tracker on their van and they were about three stops away from me and they decide to call it a day and mark my delivery as no one at home.

That was infuriating, no delivery and a blatant lie from the courier!

[westminstrel]

DHL’s customs fees are the worst. I hate them for it. UPS charges much less. DHL are thieves imo. If someone with reputation could effect change at the RM, I’m happy to participate; please count me in. 

[Fadeingstar]

Worst one for me was when a postal worker cut open my package to steal the contents.

Edited February 2, 2022 by Fadeingstar

[Foster88]

I’ve had Royal Mail leave parcels in the wheelie bin before and thankfully not on bin day but what a stupid thing to do.

I wouldn’t mind but I’d been at home at the time.

[Petra]

Our front door opens out on to a no vehicle open plan front, with the public footpath about four yards away. Came home and a parcel, was sat outside the front door. The message on phone said it had been delivered 4 hours earlier! Lucky still there.

The amount of parcels I get that are supposedly signed for and get wedged into letter box.

I send a lot of of largish stuff with Hermes …. always pay extra for signed for as it appears they have a bad reputation for dumping stuff

[AppleZippoandMetronome]

Generally when parcels are left its at my request and they're left in a storage box I have out front. I live out in the sticks though so parcels being left out of sight aren't really at any risk. Even if it was left on the door step it would be at more risk from the rain than thieves. Now this is my choice and it isn't one I would have made at any of my previous addresses when I lived in either towns or cities with plenty of people wandering by. I absolutely understand the concerns and complaints regarding any parcels being left on door steps let along higher valued ones.

Now regarding DHL specifically my only complaint would be how erratic their delivery service is in my area. Today for example I had a notification that my rather large order of seed trays is out for delivery for Tuesday Feb 1. Except of course its Wednesday Feb 2nd and given that its almost 5pm as I type this I don't think its showing up today. This is my experience with anything delivered via DHL including RM orders. They just kind of show up when they show up. Again I do live out in the sticks well off the beaten path but none of the other couriers or Royal Mail seem to have the same difficulties.

Edited February 2, 2022 by AppleZippoandMetronome

[blackadder]

2 hours ago, westminstrel said:

DHL’s customs fees are the worst. I hate them for it. UPS charges much less. DHL are thieves imo. If someone with reputation could effect change at the RM, I’m happy to participate; please count me in. 

Cuz it's made up bullshit to increase their profits I had one they never even opened the customs thing i put on the box.So how did they know the % of the fees 😂 plus they had all the info when i bought the shipping from them.

and ofc,i had three parcels thrown into another persons garden over a wall for whatever reasons lol.

 

 

[Paul]

Nobody likes to hear and read these sort of things happening, it awful and very stressful to deal with

I am lucky to be self employed & no kids and can easily enough juggle my jobs/work without too much fuss

i go out of my way to be in and always available for when I know a big delivery is due to arrive, or I arrange for a partner/family member/parent to be in to receive it if at all possible

For the majority of self employed courier drivers, they are only paid the minimum but paid additional for every successful delivery they do (i believe),  so more deliveries they do in a day, the greater their pay, hence racing round like blue arsed flies and cutting corners, time is money for them

This leads to stuff hardly ever being returned back to depot as it only means a return trip to re-deliver again for the courier. This leads to being left with neighbours, in hidden places etc  

Fingers crossed the delivery arrives early in the day, but I will catch up on some business admin/paper work, do some house work, do the washing or ironing, prep the tea early, bake some treats, cut grass the lawn, rake the leaves in front garden, wash the van to kill some time productively 

Utilise and see if you can track the delivery drivers progress, some tell you how many stops they are away from  

With Royal Mail Special Delivery you know it will arrive by 1pm the vast majority of the time, so not all your day is lost

Try to get to know or interact with your delivery person, a bottle of water on a warm day, will single you out as their best customer of the day, when 99/100 deliveries for the day wont think to do a single thing

If you know delivery is going a problem and you know 100% you may very well not be in (i.e. hospital appointment) use the arrange re-delivery or rescheduling delivery you can do with most courier companies for a day you know 100% you will be in to take it yourself

Even if it arrives at 16.45 and you have lost days work,  your £5,000+ parcel of hard work/effort/toils arrives in my hand in safety without stress.  You know you can sleep easy that night 

I don't think i could be out working all day, if i knew there was a chance of a five grand parcel being left with my least liked neighbour, left on the doorstep or inside the wheelie bin when its collection day 

Lastly, being always available to take delivery also gives you the option to refuse the delivery if it is tampered/resealed/opened and ask to return to sender.   Your words against if its been left with others or in safe spot in your absence 

Edited February 2, 2022 by Paul

[Petra]

Royal Mail is best, if I miss them I get a card and just walk up the village next day to the post office to pick it up.

[MJCOIN]

This happened to me last week.

TSF member sent me 2 coins via Royal Mail Special Delivery to my office address. I arranged to be there on the day of delivery (office is not usually manned).  Delivery failed to arrive as the parcel had been sent to the wrong delivery office.  I asked (via RM website) for the parcel to be delivered to the local Post Office near my office as I knew an attempt to deliver to the office would most likely fail as no one was going to be there the following day.

I receive an email the following day saying the parcel had been delivered - I assumed this was to the local Post Office.  I went to the Post Office this morning on the way to the office to collect the parcel.  Staff couldn't find it.  Luckily the RM delivery office is a 5 minute walk away and they were still open for another 8 minutes.  Staff at the delivery office checked and the parcel wasn't there.  They checked online and the parcel was delivered to the PO as far as they were concerned.  Back to the PO - still can't find the parcel.  By now I'm getting a bit upset at the potential loss of over £2k of coins.

Drove to the office and thankfully the coins had been delivered there (the parcel was small enough to fit through the letterbox).

This has happended to me many times - the delivery office don't follow instructions and keep on trying to deliver to my office instead of redirecting it to the PO (which is open all day and is therefore more convenient for me to collect from).

I have raised a complaint about this before and was assured that the staff had been spoken to.

Absolute joke.

[SilverPlatinum]

🙂 When I go away and I know something is coming I usually tell my neighbor or my relative to pick it up for me.

I have a Blink (Amazon) security camera on my front door, so when anyone leaves me something I get a video notification and I can see the package, then I send SMS to my neighbor or relative to pick it up and put it inside my house.

The key here is to have a good trusted neighbor or a nearby relative who lives near your house.

 

 

[TheDoc]

8 hours ago, Foster88 said:

I’ve had Royal Mail leave parcels in the wheelie bin before and thankfully not on bin day but what a stupid thing to do.

I wouldn’t mind but I’d been at home at the time.

I had a simular thing happen to me, I was in work got a notification to say my coffee machine had been delivered. So rang home....No sign of any coffe machine. Checked with neighbours..nope. Got in contact with them but the driver was finished for the day 🤔 

Circa 2 hours later the office called me back they had contacted the driver and he kindly informed them that he had left said coffee machine in the green recycling bin...... Problem being my bin wasn't out for collection and was tucked up in my back garden!!

2 more calls and 1 hour later the driver then realised that he actually put it in the bin in no. 72 xxxxxxxxxxx road. instead of my house no.22 xxxxxxxxxxxx park. 2 streets away.

And YES it was bin day. 

Miraculously my Father managed to retrieve the package before the bin was emptied. 

On a separate issue, since Brexit and customs declarations, I've decided to no longer buy from my favourite source for Jewellery making bullion supplies, silver wire, sheet, grain, semi precious stones etc. Reason being the packages are now clearly labelled as to the exact contents and value, printed for all to see as clear as day.