City-link strike again

[Reece]

Happened to me the other week. Ordered next day from wiggle on the Sunday. Due on Tuesday but never turned up. Redelivery for weds. Carded but no card same again Thursday. Ended up changing addresses to my work but had to then drive in to get parcel home.

Told wiggle no chance using them again for priority items if they continue to use city link. Another purchase on same day (forgot to add to basket) came on the Tuesday via free delivery.

City link CS said the driver must of carded as they had a photo of my front door on each occasion which I never got to see. Also was called a liar as my other half waited next to front door (our sofa is next to the door) and never heard a Knock let alone a van pull up.

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

I used to have a great Citylink driver. my home and my work were on the same delivery route.... and he would automatically divert all my packages to my work place for me, irrespective of what address they had on them! Worked great until the day I ordered something weighing +30kg which he delivered to my work place for me not realising I commuted to work by mtb across country! Had to take the car to work that night to collect it!
Though I will say from a work point of view CL did occasionally fail spectacularly not least of all the time when they collected 8 or 9 laptop repairs from us (in appropriate boxes & with return addresses (my precaution)), and some 2.5 miles from work the door of their van opened whilst they were driving, packages came out of back of van and were promptly run over by following vehicles. The driver never knew/stopped and said packages were returned to us by a very apologetic driver who had run them over, collected them up, seen return address and driven back them back to us....

But they were better than some of the other delivery drivers who despite there being only 1 house at the top of our 1 mile long track, clearly named at the bottom of the track before they set off up it (across the gate they had to open!), would routinely drive up the track and because the GPS/SatNav said this was the correct postcode (our home being the exact centre) would frequently leave deliveries on our door step or across the track blocking it...

• 400kg of chicken feed
• 200kg pheasant food
• +£1,000 alcohol just prior to Christmas one year - shame we don't drink
• +£400 ocado shopping (could only have just been left because in +25C heat the butter was still solid) (we got to keep all of it)
• a pallet of concrete mix (20kg bags)
• various unknown items spread across 5 pallets randomly left in the middle of the track blocking it
• various of those Jewson bags of gravel
• a load of stone chippings dumped in the middle of the parking area

If we did not have someone else's delivery at least once every 3 months we were doing well...

 

[e-rider]

remember that these courier drivers are expected to make loads of drops each day for peanuts pay - high stress and low pay - why would they care about your parcel!

 

[Reece]

remember that these courier drivers are expected to make loads of drops each day for peanuts pay - high stress and low pay - why would they care about your parcel!

Just like the numerous other courier company's yet city link and yodel are by far my worst. DPD are by far my favourites. Only ever one incident with them. A van broke down but they let me know before delivery was due and yes these things happen.

 

[PaulB]

Jesus, stuff like that gets sent by commercial courier?!?!?

There's no other way to get stuff around the whole of Europe so yes, it does.

 

[MattHB]

remember that these courier drivers are expected to make loads of drops each day for peanuts pay - high stress and low pay - why would they care about your parcel!

Because its their job?

 

[paul04]

At one point (after banging my head against a brick wall, and going round in circles with UPS) I came to the conclusion that UPS stood for "useless pathetic service"

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

remember that these courier drivers are expected to make loads of drops each day for peanuts pay - high stress and low pay - why would they care about your parcel!

yep - I have a brother who is one (in London). started as a cycle courier, then went to motorbikes, and now in a van. he does not understand some of the issues I have had either, he can't get his head around some of his collegues attitudes to deliveries

 

[Andrew_P]

400+ consignments and 500 odd parcels sent on Monday. 16 Carded, 2 (customer postcode errors) 5 unknown problem. Which is ok. They are having problems with a few depots, also 50%+ of the drivers are franchise andthe top rate per parcel is on 1st attempt strike rate.

They lose money, I get a Citylink newsletter every month from the CEO which rather strangely keeps banging on about how ell he is doing at reducing the quarterly loss.

DPD are without a doubt the best, but it comes at a price and they are now aiming their market at the small to medium size parcel and have introduced a much stiffer volumetric calculaion that blows a few of my items into the £9+ .

Citylink on the Thursday before Chrsitmas withdrew next day service and wouldn't guarantee anything arriving before Christmas sent after midday.

The first courier company that breaks rank and goes to day shift, and afternoon/9pm evening shift and 7 day collection\delivery will nail the market.

 

[redcard]

The first courier company that breaks rank and goes to day shift, and afternoon/9pm evening shift and 7 day collection\delivery will nail the market.

Why do none of them seem keen to do this?

 

[e-rider]

Because its their job?

when you're being exploited (i.e. hard work for low pay) it doesn't make you take much pride/care in your work! Companies that pay a decent wage get much better results/performance from their employees, no matter what the line of work happens to be.

 

[Andrew_P]

Why do none of them seem keen to do this?

B2B is so ingrained in to their management at a guess. Not so long ago you had to lie a bit to get them to shift B2C. Not so much now, DPD seem to be heading more to managing B2C.

For me they all have so much invested in tangible assets like vans, over nighters and warehouse\distribution\hubs and yet are only working them 7 til 5 x 5 days a week. They just cannot seem to get their heads round making deliveries at 7am-9pm 7 days a week thye would jyust need their senders to identify the parcel as busines or consumer to decide which shift pattern got the job.. The weakest link for all couriers is Monday collection for Tuesday deliveries so why not dilute that load over the Sat/Sun

 

[Silver Fox]

I ordered some kit from Wiggle yesterday and paid for next day delivery. They sent me an e-mail with a consignment number and a link to Metapack something or other so I can track my order. The consignment number was not recognised.

I e-mailed Wiggle this morning who informed me the carrier was City Link. Again, the tracking number was not recognised so I rang City Link who gave me the correct number that was nothing like the one supplied by Wiggle. City Link were very helpful and confirmed my parcel was out for delivery today, it arrived this afternoon.

Not very impressed with Wiggle to be honest.

 

[MattHB]

Went to the depot. Mentioned no card. He tried to pull up the image of the door. No image busted

 

[Little yellow Brompton]

remember that these courier drivers are expected to make loads of drops each day for peanuts pay - high stress and low pay - why would they care about your parcel!

Because they are paid to?