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Jul 18, 2020 15:40:33 GMT
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I use hermes a fair bit, mainly because i can do it all online and print the label in the shop. I'm not buying another printer for it to stop working again. I'm not waiting at the Post office to post something since half of them have closed down the ones left are always busy.
RM do seem to be alot more popular these days, most of my ebay buys come with them, i guessing its because they can actually track stuff now without it costing a stupid price.
don't know why its taken them so long, they have all the infrastructure in place to absolutely dominate the industry yet they tootle along changing slowly.
All those post offices they have closed could have been parcel hubs, pre-order drop off and click and collect style pickup.
Ive been loving RM while ive not been at work everyday, sure that will change when I'm back and miss a delivery and have to go to the sorting office to receive the slowest service known to mankind.
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melle
South West
It'll come out in the wash.
Posts: 1,983
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Jul 18, 2020 15:49:41 GMT
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I use hermes a fair bit, mainly because i can do it all online and print the label in the shop. You can do that with the Post Office/ Royal Mail/ ParcelForce too.
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www.saabv4.com'70 Saab 96 V4 "The Devil's Own V4" '77 Saab 95 V4 van conversion project '88 Saab 900i 8V
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glenanderson
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 4,105
Club RR Member Number: 64
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I send a lot less parcels than I receive, but still probably 100 a year. If it’s under 2kg then I use the post office because it’s usually the best value and my local branch is a staffed by a pleasant, competent, and hard working couple that are an asset to the village. If it’s over 2kg then I use UPS through Parcel2Go; not the cheapest, but I have found them to be reliable and consistent, and the nearest “drop shop” is 100 yards away (although it’s staffed by an utter misery). Anything heavy I pick the service that collects them from my address. I always pay the extra for full compensation on higher value stuff, and also the “delivery guarantee” which refunds the base price if the 24h service ends up being 48 or more. I think that their system is much more likely to miraculously “find” a stray parcel that’s going to cost them £100+ to compensate than one that’s not.
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My worst worry about dying is my wife selling my stuff for what I told her it cost...
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cjhillman
Posted a lot
1979 Capri (Rolling Project) 1985 Escort mk3 (Daily)
Posts: 1,580
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Jul 19, 2020 11:00:12 GMT
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I've sent a few parcels of the last few weeks with Hermes. All car parts (radios, indicator stalks brake callipers) and they're so much cheaper and easier. When i send the Callipers I took them to the Royal mail to see how much (and to see how much they weighed)... £17 they wanted to send them!!! Hermes was about £7. I did send a Car part with the Royal Mail last week though and the guy didnt seem to mind when I said it was a Car part, he did smile a bit though... so don't know what that means.
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Jul 19, 2020 20:36:00 GMT
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My missus is a se driver for Hermes since she got made redundant. Averages 64p per parcel delivered but still cares enough to try her best to deliver everything properly. Can imagine that only getting 64p per parcel wears a person down after a while so might explain some of the videos I've seen of Hermes drivers blatantly not giving af. In fact 64p per parcel minus fuel/running costs might go some way to explaining a 2001 Vectra as a delivery vehicle to try and actually attain minimum wage...... 64p per parcel isn't a great amount considering the minimum for a parcel charged to the customer is £2.90. However, I'm sure the Hermes delivery people will be more keen on getting that finalised scan when they deliver as then they know they'll get paid. Postman Prat who delivers to me (and leaves parcels on my car bonnet, scratching it, thanks Prat!) doesn't give a t0ss what gets delivered or not as he gets paid either way.
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melle
South West
It'll come out in the wash.
Posts: 1,983
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Jul 19, 2020 20:56:57 GMT
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It's a race to the bottom sadly in parcel/ post land... In a previous life I was a very well paid driver/ postman at the Dutch mail; they were one of the first postal companies to lay off nearly all their workers on permanent contracts with pensions, and replace them with cheap disposable labour and underpaid subcontractors. (In the end it worked out very well for me personally, I went back to uni and they paid my tuition fees and some more.) I'm sure something similar will happen at RM at some point.
As a matter of principle, I never sell stuff on eBay with "free shipping". Everybody knows free shipping is a myth, and the drivers are made to pay for it.
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www.saabv4.com'70 Saab 96 V4 "The Devil's Own V4" '77 Saab 95 V4 van conversion project '88 Saab 900i 8V
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Jul 19, 2020 21:18:50 GMT
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My missus is a se driver for Hermes since she got made redundant. Averages 64p per parcel delivered but still cares enough to try her best to deliver everything properly. Can imagine that only getting 64p per parcel wears a person down after a while so might explain some of the videos I've seen of Hermes drivers blatantly not giving af. In fact 64p per parcel minus fuel/running costs might go some way to explaining a 2001 Vectra as a delivery vehicle to try and actually attain minimum wage...... 64p per parcel isn't a great amount considering the minimum for a parcel charged to the customer is £2.90. However, I'm sure the Hermes delivery people will be more keen on getting that finalised scan when they deliver as then they know they'll get paid. Postman Prat who delivers to me (and leaves parcels on my car bonnet, scratching it, thanks Prat!) doesn't give a t0ss what gets delivered or not as he gets paid either way. Of course he does & so should everyone else, instead of what is basically curse word rate piece work
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Jul 19, 2020 21:27:21 GMT
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Didn't know that and TBH that's a jolly good reason for NOT using Herpes.
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cjj
Part of things
Posts: 275
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Jul 19, 2020 22:35:36 GMT
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As a matter of principle, I never sell stuff on eBay with "free shipping". Everybody knows free shipping is a myth, and the drivers are made to pay for it. eBay do tend to penalise you for not doing 'free shipping'. The bonus also from the business POV is that you can include it in the price, then you don't have to discount charging postage multiple times on the same order. I'm not sure what it has to do with drivers, though?
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glenanderson
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 4,105
Club RR Member Number: 64
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Jul 19, 2020 23:58:48 GMT
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As a matter of principle, I never sell stuff on eBay with "free shipping". Everybody knows free shipping is a myth, and the drivers are made to pay for it. eBay do tend to penalise you for not doing 'free shipping'. The bonus also from the business POV is that you can include it in the price, then you don't have to discount charging postage multiple times on the same order. I'm not sure what it has to do with drivers, though? “Free” postage is a pain in the posterior if you want to buy multiple items and the seller is awkward. I’m all for paying £5 if it translated to £1 for the item and £4 for postage if it saves me time/fuel/resources, but I’m not happy about spending £20 for four £1 items that will have been packaged together won’t have cost any more to post than the £4 a single item would have. EBay’s system, after all these years, should be better able to cope with things than it is.
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My worst worry about dying is my wife selling my stuff for what I told her it cost...
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ferny
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 984
Club RR Member Number: 13
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melle
South West
It'll come out in the wash.
Posts: 1,983
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The bonus also from the business POV is that you can include it in the price, then you don't have to discount charging postage multiple times on the same order. I'm not sure what it has to do with drivers, though? The problem is that bulk shippers don't include most of the real shipping cost in the price, but negotiate cheap shipping contracts with courier companies, who then offload the problem onto the bottom of the food chain (and never on their shareholders...). I realise that by using Parcel Monkey or other brokers I'm supporting this system too; I'm still trying to find a balance as I wouldn't be able to sell anything on eBay any more if buyers had to pay the full Parcel Force price for, say, shipping a crankshaft.
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www.saabv4.com'70 Saab 96 V4 "The Devil's Own V4" '77 Saab 95 V4 van conversion project '88 Saab 900i 8V
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eBay do tend to penalise you for not doing 'free shipping'. The bonus also from the business POV is that you can include it in the price, then you don't have to discount charging postage multiple times on the same order. I'm not sure what it has to do with drivers, though? “Free” postage is a pain in the posterior if you want to buy multiple items and the seller is awkward. I’m all for paying £5 if it translated to £1 for the item and £4 for postage if it saves me time/fuel/resources, but I’m not happy about spending £20 for four £1 items that will have been packaged together won’t have cost any more to post than the £4 a single item would have. EBay’s system, after all these years, should be better able to cope with things than it is. Hi, In that scenario you could buy the four items in four separate transactions, you still pay the same £20 but at least the driver gets four lots of 64p and the seller doesn't get an bonus £12. I do this with some Chinese sellers, last time I ordered two LED floodlights, they sent one which apparently is a common practice unbeknown to me at the time. Unfortunately for them the courier put the parcel weight on the label which was the weight of one, I took a pic of it and pointed it out and they had to send the second out. Colin
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Last Edit: Jul 20, 2020 9:00:44 GMT by colnerov
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cjj
Part of things
Posts: 275
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“Free” postage is a pain in the posterior if you want to buy multiple items and the seller is awkward. I’m all for paying £5 if it translated to £1 for the item and £4 for postage if it saves me time/fuel/resources, but I’m not happy about spending £20 for four £1 items that will have been packaged together won’t have cost any more to post than the £4 a single item would have. EBay’s system, after all these years, should be better able to cope with things than it is. Hi, In that scenario you could buy the four items in four separate transactions, you still pay the same £20 but at least the driver gets four lots of 64p and the seller doesn't get an bonus £12. There's no guarantee of that though - I don't think there are any rules that would stop the seller sending them out as one. It's difficult with the decals and that I've been putting on eBay - for the most part, it's full of people charging £1 or £2 with 'free postage', where the postage is always going to be at least 70p or so (unrecorded), then Paypal will take 30p, and eBay will take some of it too. If you don't do 'free postage' the eBay algorithms will penalise you (possibly charge you more, can't remember) so ideally the only way you're not paying yourself sweatshop wages is if someone makes a multiple order.
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melle
South West
It'll come out in the wash.
Posts: 1,983
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I'm not sure eBay penalises you for not offering "free" shipping, but they do charge a fee over the shipping as well. I suppose this is to stop sellers from deflating prices to avoid fees, and then overcharging on shipping to compensate for the lower sales price. I don't care too much about potential algorithmic penalties though, I mostly sell Ford/ Saab V4 parts to help fellow enthusiast and make a few quid to justify my own V4 projects, I'm not dependent on for making a living. By the way, this was one of my rides:
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Last Edit: Jul 20, 2020 10:00:05 GMT by melle
www.saabv4.com'70 Saab 96 V4 "The Devil's Own V4" '77 Saab 95 V4 van conversion project '88 Saab 900i 8V
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glenanderson
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 4,105
Club RR Member Number: 64
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Jul 20, 2020 11:28:09 GMT
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Just spoke to the chap in the local Post Office...
He told me that they are no longer allowed to accept the generic description “car parts” for parcel contents. They are still allowed to send car parts, but you must be more specific as to the actual contents. “Starter motor” is ok, as would be any other inert car parts, but too many people have used the vague term “car parts” when sending stuff that was on their proscribed list.
Hope that helps.
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My worst worry about dying is my wife selling my stuff for what I told her it cost...
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melle
South West
It'll come out in the wash.
Posts: 1,983
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Jul 20, 2020 12:09:48 GMT
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www.saabv4.com'70 Saab 96 V4 "The Devil's Own V4" '77 Saab 95 V4 van conversion project '88 Saab 900i 8V
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Jul 20, 2020 15:21:39 GMT
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I have nothing to add to this thread other than I've just sent the ParcelFarce delivery driver away with a box containing a new toilet in about 10 pieces. To be fair he was good about it, pointing out the footprint on the box and suggesting I might want to check it before he left.
That was foam packed, double skin cardboard, foam blocks around that then another outer skin of cardboard. It must have seen quite a bit of pressure as there were certainly no punctures.
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Jul 20, 2020 15:36:25 GMT
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Conflicting information everywhere then My local sub post office just told me they no nothing about this issue, business as Normal when I drop my sold stuff
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Fraud owners club member 1999 Jaguar s type 1993 ford escort
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Jul 20, 2020 15:38:16 GMT
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Just spoke to the chap in the local Post Office... He told me that they are no longer allowed to accept the generic description “car parts” for parcel contents. They are still allowed to send car parts, but you must be more specific as to the actual contents. “Starter motor” is ok, as would be any other inert car parts, but too many people have used the vague term “car parts” when sending stuff that was on their proscribed list. Hope that helps. Well I sell motorcycle parts, can’t see there’s a difference (apart from the obvious) & I still just say motorcycle parts, never a problem.
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