Parcel companies in the UK have underdelivered this year, according to a Citizen Advice Bureau survey. Over 8,000 customers reviewed the service they received last month from Royal Mail, DPD, Yodel, Amazon Logistics, or Evri. None of these five companies scored more than three-star ratings from its users.
Amazon and Royal Mail scored 2.75 out of 5, the highest, but failed to reach a three-star rating. Evri and Yodel came in last, both achieving two stars.
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Earlier this month, Locate2u News questioned the flood of complaints Evri’s customers post daily on social media platforms. Reports of poor service centered around late deliveries, damaged parcels, poor communication, and misplaced packages.
In March 2022, Hermes turned a new page by rebranding as Evri. Ironically, under its previous brand name, the courier firm was also stained with allegations of poor service.
Although it scored the lowest in this survey, it’s still an accredited seller fulfilled prime carrier for Amazon, the top-ranked firm in this study. Evri told Locate2u that it has enormous volumes of parcels to process daily, serving 12 million customers weekly.
Parcel delivery problems
Ofcom is a regulatory body that overseas the postal industry; it cannot review individual complaints against postal firms. Ofcom policy clearly states: If you have a contract with the parcel company or the problem relates to the delivery itself (for example, the behavior of the delivery driver), you should complain to the parcel company.
Based on the outcome of the recent study, Citizen Advice is now calling on Ofcom to take action. “It’s clear from our results that delivery problems remain an outstanding issue, with a particular focus on parcels being left in an insecure location.”
There are now calls for the regulator to review their new complaints system. “[They] should consider enforcement action, such as launching investigations or issuing fines, if there have been no significant improvements by this date,” says Citizen Advice.
Ofcom advises complainants to complain to parcel companies directly and demands you be told who to contact, how to submit, the complaint process, and how to deal with trained staff.
No improvements
The state of parcel companies in the UK has not improved over the last year; it has regressed. “The rate of parcel problems remains far too high across the board,” agrees Citizen Advice.
The NGO is also calling for Ofcom to expand its monitoring processes to fully capture the type of rate of delivery problems across the board. It says this should include consumer issues when they both receive and send parcels. The results should be used to take action against companies with “persistently high rates of problems,” it says.
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The survey found that 34% of shoppers in the UK experience delivery problems, which include parcels left in insecure locations and boxes arriving late. The worst offenders are Yodel (40%), DPD (37%) and Evri (34%).
The biggest problem facing most parcel firms is poor customer complaints processes. Nearly half of the complainants have trouble trying to resolve an issue. “In the end, over half (53%) of those that had further issues found it difficult to resolve their problem. This figure rose to 60% of people with a disability.”
Royal Mail has now focused its attention on customers with special needs. The new feature on its mobile app allows customers to register their needs via Parcel Collect. A simple ‘knock louder’ note will change the entire service for these customers.
About the author
Mia is a multi-award-winning journalist. She has more than 14 years of experience in mainstream media. She's covered many historic moments that happened in Africa and internationally. She has a strong focus on human interest stories, to bring her readers and viewers closer to the topics at hand.
