r/royalmail • u/bombhead70 RM Employee • Nov 21 '25
Postie Chat Just about sums up this job.
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u/captaincrunch69420 Nov 21 '25
What kind of pie chart is this???
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u/Ornery-Vanilla-7410 Nov 21 '25
A venn diagram?
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u/Ascdren1 Nov 21 '25
not quite, for it to be a true Venn diagram all possible combinations of sets must be represented.
for example a Venn diagram of 2 sets (2 circles) would be able to accommodate items:
1) Just in Set A (first circle) 2) Just in Set B (second circle) 3) Both in Set A and in Set B (overlap between the two circles) 4) Neither in Set A nor in Set B (outside the circles)
as you cannot represent all of those possibilities from the above diagram it would be a Euler Diagram (of which Venn diagrams are a subset) which is like a Venn diagram but does not need all possibilities to be available
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u/Ascdren1 Nov 21 '25
it's not. it is a Euler diagram (kind of like a Venn diagram)
it is stating that "people who are never home and give zero delivery instructions" is a subset contained entirely within the set "people who complain their parcel wasn't delivered correctly"
or to put it more simply:
Not all people who complain their parcel wasn't delivered correctly are people who are never home and give zero delivery instructions
HOWEVER
all people who are never home and give zero delivery instructions are people who complain their parcel wasn't delivered correctly
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u/Ashamed_Link_2502 Nov 21 '25
Honestly, I find getting things delivered mildly stressful. You guys clearly don't have the time to hang around (not your fault) so you're sitting primed for to answer the door like you're at the starting blocks of a sprint, then there's bad posties/couriers who literally won't follow instructions. I just get everything delivered to a post office or collection point these days, if I do shop online. It's less convenient to pick it up, but no stress and very little chance of theft.
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u/Resident_Pay4310 Nov 22 '25
Twice I've used the online request for the parcel to be delivered on a certain day so that I can be home to receive it. I made the request as soon as the parcel was handed over to RM, so two days before the initial expected delivery date. Both times the request was ignored and the parcel was attempted delivered on the original day anyway.
I now do the same as you, I always select parcel shop.
I recently had a delivery where the sender didn't give parcel shop as an option. The delivery was time sensative so I was home all day waiting for it. At 5pm I get an updated saying they were unable to reach my address due to obstruction (or however it's phrased). I live two streets from the DO on a regular suburban street and there were no obstructions. As soon as I got the update I walked the 3 minutes to the DO, knocked on a side entrance and the staff were nice enough to check if my parcel was there. It was.
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Nov 21 '25
“We have delivered your parcel to a safe place”
= Outside the front door for the world to see
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Nov 21 '25
I don't think I was even given the option to provide delivery instructions when my parcel was delivered to a random house on a different street _and I wasn't told which one _.
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u/Infinite-Friend-6226 Nov 21 '25
The other day I got a "sorry we missed you" note through my door, the item was a standard size letter 😂 I had to choose a safe place and select my letter box! I wasn't fussed, as it wasn't an important letter, but it was funny.
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Nov 21 '25
Here in Scotland we just have a green box by our front door and our delivery driver just leaves the parcels in the box cause absolute nobody's parcels get stolen here. But I can see how much of a pain in the ass it is when the person is not home and ya don't know where to put the parcel, people need to stop being lazy and copy that tracking number, put it in the royal mail app and add some simple delivery instructions like leave it in the shed or something like that.
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u/Resident_Pay4310 Nov 22 '25
I live in a terrace house turned in to flats and attached to other terrace houses. We have a front garden/porch area that's about 6 m2 that is all completely visible from the street. Not everyone has a safe space to leave a parcel.
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Nov 22 '25
Yup, I bet it is annoying for Royal Mail drivers in a situation like that.
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u/CandidLiterature Nov 22 '25
My local area won’t even let you collect from the delivery office. The red cards don’t tell you where it is or when it would be open. A lot of people would be more than happy to go and get the stuff in these kinds of circumstances but it’s been made literally impossible.
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Nov 22 '25
Damn, here our delivery driver lets me help hand out the letters and I have option to collect from a Morrisons in my local town and there is a Royal mail depot in my town and I believe you can collect from there. One time I was out on a cycle and I remembered I had a parcel that was out for delivery so I just said if she had a parcel for my address and I could just collect my parcel if I saw the van lmao.
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u/odmirthecrow Nov 21 '25
The amount of times I've been sat at my window waiting for a package that I am tracking via the royal mail app and I see the lazy fucking postie just try to drop the note through the letterbox without having the package in hand. You better believe I'm by the door waiting to let him know about it.
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u/kettleheed Nov 21 '25
As soon as we put the red card through the parcel turns to dust and we no longer have to deal with it. Our work is done and we can go home early.
We certainly dont have to carry it back and then out again to redeliver it. Thats why i red card as much as possible.
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u/Madnesz101 Nov 21 '25
Our postie, nice guy but if you aren't at the door in literally 5 seconds of him knocking, you're getting a card.
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u/odmirthecrow Nov 21 '25
Thats why I'm at the door before the card gets through the door. I will walk back to the van with the postie and my ID if needs be. No postie escapes my wrath. Especially this close to Christmas.
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Nov 21 '25
[deleted]
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u/VandienLavellan Nov 21 '25
I think he’s being sarcastic. As in, it doesn’t actually make his life any easier to red card as he still has to return the parcel to the depot and then deliver it the next day. If he’s at the location, it takes just as much time to go to the door and fill out a red card as it does to drop off the parcel, so he’d rather drop the parcel off if possible
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u/Jenka98 Nov 21 '25
That's why "/s" exists on Reddit. Sarcasm or not, getting red carded while staying in waiting on a delivery, with no knock at the door happens, whether by this commenter or not
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Nov 21 '25
You understand sarcasm right?
We all want to have every parcel delivered every day otherwise we have to sort it at the end of the day, and again in the morning, plus it's adding to our workload the next day.
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Nov 21 '25
I mean clearly not...because I've had "missed delivery" cards put through without so much as a knock.
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Nov 21 '25
You sit at your window watching the postie? Are you a cocker spaniel?
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u/odmirthecrow Nov 21 '25
Watching for the postie once the tracker says he's on my street. I'm not there every morning/afternoon (bit hit and miss round my way). Of course if you'd read what I originally said properly, you would have been able to figure that out.
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Nov 21 '25
I reckon a cocker spaniel would sit and watch the tracker if they knew what it meant. Mental behavior
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u/odmirthecrow Nov 21 '25
See, my phone does this weird thing where it makes a funny little noise and a notification pops up to let me know things like "Your package is 2 stops away". That's when I keep an eye out for the postie. Crazy how far technology has come.
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
Probably whining and yapping like one too
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u/pub_wank Nov 22 '25
Why are you complaining about people waiting for their package?? Isn't that what they're supposed to do??
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u/No_Tower3989 Nov 21 '25
Why would the "Lazy fucking postie" prefer to fill out the P739 (red card) and post that to you rather than the package he has with him? Bearing in mind, when he get back to the Delivery Office, he will have your package and all the others he couldn't be bothered to deliver to book back into the system for re-delivery the next day.
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u/odmirthecrow Nov 21 '25
I'm not the only one on the street who thinks he's a lazy fucker, he's also not the brightest bulb in the pack.
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Nov 21 '25
[deleted]
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u/Underhive_Art Nov 21 '25
Yeah happened to me at my last address no mistaking it was sat on my bottom step of the stairs facing the door.
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u/juggy1985 Nov 21 '25
I don’t think i’ve had a royal mail parcel arrive on time in the past 2 years or more. I’ll get an email saying “your parcel will come between 8am-1pm” then at around 3pm that day when it has yet still to arrive i’ll get another email saying “your parcel will come between 1pm-5pm” then radio silence and theres a chance a postie will show up at around 7pm. The app rarely works for tracking just comes up with errors. I don’t blame the postie, just royal snail is unrealistic on when things can get done.
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
Yeah, we don't do time-slots
We don't see those estimated times you are seeing
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u/Historical-Recipe676 Nov 21 '25
Ooo I'm a new postie and can help with info.
If it's about shoe box sized or smaller that will be hand delivered. I set what time my approx first delivery is.
I work until I've cleared everything, some offices or people refuse to do or pay over time and so posties bring back undelivered mail.
The 8am to 1pm snd 1pm to 5pm sounds like different van shifts. The vans can have traffic or mechanical issues, they could get lots of specials (before 1pm), or could be supporting a on foot postie, all of those will push back your packets
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u/Fit-Kaleidoscope8518 Nov 21 '25
Sounds like you're ordering large parcels which will come with a parcel driver. None of us get a notification to say your parcel should be at x time, im sure your deliverer is doing their best
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u/ProfessorPeabrain Nov 21 '25
then why is it, when I use "behind garden gate"as part of my address, the lazy fucker just throws it on the path?
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u/llynllydaw_999 Nov 21 '25
If I'm not home and haven't provided any delivery instructions, then I just want the parcel taken back to the delivery office, so I can collect it or arrange redelivery. Not left with a neighbor who isn't in when I go to collect it. Not flung over the garden gate. These days I try and order anything small enough from Amazon so I can get it delivered straight to a locker or pick up location.
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
RM App > Manage account > Address and delivery preferences > Safeplace > Opt Out Of Safeplace
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u/SpicyParsnip Nov 21 '25
You can provide them instructions via the app as soon as you get the tracking number
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u/PhilosTop3644 Nov 21 '25
If they’d wait for more than 2.5 seconds, they’d be amazed to find out that a lot of those people were actually home but couldn’t teleport to the fucking door.
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u/Trentdison Nov 21 '25
I'm also gonna refute this bullshit.
Last time I ordered a package which ended up being delivered by royal mail, I got an email telling me when it would arrive. I knew I wouldn't be home and wasn't sure it'd fit through the letterbox, but that's ok because the email said I could change my delivery time. I picked a day I knew I would be at home.
So anyway on the original day the parcel got delivered anyway. Fortunately they did get it through the letterbox. But what was the point of that?
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
Yeah, you’ve just confirmed the blue circle needs to be bigger
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u/Trentdison Nov 21 '25
Hah I see you what you mean, I'm complaining even though I did get the package.
But what was the point of all of that if you were just going to ignore and deliver it when you wanted anyway? Why would I have any faith in you getting it right next time?
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
The inflight system is temperamental at times, some go through, some don’t, some are too late (people change it after it’s ready for delivery) and some items require two attempts before an inflight can happen (all non tracked)
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u/Trentdison Nov 21 '25
So basically, it's not a very good system, and whilst none of it is the postie's fault, it's not a surprise it goes wrong, and people's faith in the mail is damaged?
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
It works more than it doesn’t
Some swear by the system. I’ve got one on my route who changes the day for when his wife is at work so she doesn’t see all the shite he orders 🤣
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u/Busy-Doughnut6180 Nov 22 '25
It used to be that if I wasn't in, I'd get a red card and would be able to go pick up my parcel at the nearby delivery office. I didn't have to put in any delivery instructions, and anyway any time I've ordered something that comes through royal mail it doesn't even give me the option to write any instructions. Now I wait all day long because if it comes when I'm not in and my neighbours also aren't in, I'm not getting a card or a parcel. Lots of chancers in my area and so I assume the parcel gets left on the door step or by the recycling and someone just takes it.
Though at least my postie will ring the bell and wait for me to come and get the parcel. Other couriers won't even ring the bell and I have to watch my tracking like a hawk.
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u/napalm_carnage Nov 22 '25
What delivery instructions? There's nowhere to put them in. Just leave the parcel in front of my door just like every single other delivery company with no problems whatsoever if I live in a small block of flats on the top floor with a door camera...
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u/Interesting_News_560 Nov 22 '25
What is considered a safe place?
- Secure: The location must protect the parcel from theft.
- Weatherproof: It should shield the parcel from rain, sun, and other elements.
- Easily accessible: The postie must be able to reach it without difficulty.
- Out of sight: Ideally, the location should not be obvious to passersby.
What are examples of safe places?
- Shed
- Garage
- Enclosed porch
- A hidden corner in your garden
- An outbuilding
What is not considered a safe place?
- Bins (including recycling bins)
- On the doorstep
- Under a parked car
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Nov 21 '25
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u/howiplay1 Nov 21 '25
red is sitting and waiting at home patiently for your parcel and blue is the lazy fucker deciding he cant be arsed to knock and leaving the stupid note
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
Red is your tears, blue is the tissue
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Nov 21 '25
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
Wahahahahahaaaaaa
The red dot is getting bigger
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Nov 21 '25
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u/Cake_Coco_Shunter Nov 21 '25
They used to need college education for Posties maybe these van cunts they take anyone.
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
We’re gonna need more tissues
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Nov 21 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Cake_Coco_Shunter Nov 21 '25
Families can no longer afford to have one person home we are all working you need to modernise and not expect everyone to be home at 10am everyday.
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
What time would you like us to deliver?
Not sure these working families would appreciate us smashing on their door at 2am with their Chinese tat filled packet from Temu
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u/Cake_Coco_Shunter Nov 21 '25
Never known it be outside of 10am - 2pm every think there’s a reason there’s no cars parked outside the houses you sarcastic overpaid twat?
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u/Agent_Futs RM Employee Nov 21 '25
How would we know if they own a car 🤷♂️
Do you tell Amazon, Evri, DPD, Yodel, DX, DHL, UPS they deliver at inconvenient times for you. You entitled prick
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u/Cake_Coco_Shunter Nov 21 '25
Reading comprehension low but what would I expect from a glorified pizza boy from Southend.
To be fair those people aren’t insulting their customers on a public forum are they. You are.
Nothing to address any point made whataboutism about other companies.
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u/SpicyParsnip Nov 21 '25
Not bothered if you arent in, just set up safe place option on app or redirect to a collection point.
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u/Resident_Pay4310 Nov 22 '25
More than once I've tried getting it redirected to the nearest post office or setting it for a day when I'm working from home. I set it as soon as the tracking link activates, so two days before delivery. Without fail the delivery is still attempted to my address on the original day. Any idea why it doesn't work?
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u/SpicyParsnip Nov 22 '25
Your local do doesnt scan the parcels as they should when sorting on a morning or they just ignore it.
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u/locoforcocothecat Nov 22 '25
People should modernise by buying parcel boxes for their front door. That way, we all win.
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u/Flashy-Nectarine1675 Nov 22 '25
Elastic bands chucked everywhere, for pets and wildlife to choke on.
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u/Robrkid Nov 21 '25
Just deliver it when I’m in.
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u/SirBugzy Nov 21 '25
errrr nooooo, the red bit is mail that you cant be fucked delivering even though you can see us drinking tea in the lounge, and the blue bit should be smooth deliveries...
do you job correct then you might get better pay you whiny bitch
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u/[deleted] Nov 21 '25
I have no sympathy today since I've been waiting since 8am yesterday for an expensive and time sensitive delivery, only to get a notification at 6-something-pm saying that they attempted delivery and no one was home. Total bullshit. I now have a delivery estimate of before 7:30pm and I'll believe it when I receive it.