IIRC DHL is especially prone to this. I think the drivers try to catch up time or whatever.

But I also have a DHL driver doing the opposite: you stay at home all day and nobody rings; then you notice that the parcel is marked as delivered on the website. What? You get outside and you see the parcel was thrown in your yard over the wall/fence/portal. You go back to DHL website and you download the receipt, to discover a beautiful fake signature of yours forged by the driver.

So he just didn't bother to ring the doorbell to save 20 seconds. He saves 20 seconds and you lose several hours waiting for him...

Also, in this subcontracting company, the drivers have very bad equipment, they do not have winter tyres (and we are talking about a mountain area...), they do not have enough large enough vans, so the drivers try to ditch as many parcels as possible in any 'possible' way because otherwise they have no room for pickups...

The driver even showed up one day with a regular compact car... He had to come back.

IN cases like that, I would have a very hard ethical time in pushing that issue of fraud onto the driver. To be honest, I haven't done that... but the thought would definitely cross my mind.

And we were not only pressed for time. We were paid by delivered parcel. Nothing else counted.

And we had to deliver the packets that were not successfully delivered to the central logistics station by 6pm.

So if we didn't perform we were f..ed.

How long ago was that? Maybe the service has gotten worse because the pay/reward system has gotten worse.

Depending on carrier, this has hellish consequences for customers who end up having to file loss/damage claims against the carrier. Your signature attests that you received it and it's intact, so when the signature is forged attesting to such, any claims filed are summarily denied.

(Consumers usually get their money back from the shipper as a matter of customer service, but the shipper still eats the loss.)

When you call dhl you only get lame exuses. "Maybe you doorbell isn't working?" Sure, DHL, sure.

Royal Mail delivered a £560 multimeter to the wrong address and to a signature which wasn't mine. Never saw it again. That took a nightmare battle from hell to get sorted.

It's pretty hard to get back to a seller and try to explain him the delivery company he is using is potentially scamming, especially as it only affects me (the receiver), not the shipper.

Which makes me feel bad for the drivers, really. I'm gonna guess that they have some very tough schedules.

Keep an eye out for them, if you can.

1. request a delivery at work, let the receptionists at your office sign for the package and very politely thank them each time (and don't do this too often)

2. place the order to be delivered at your home address, knowing that you won't be there and that you'll have to pick up the "you were out..." slip, and duck out of work and cross town later in the week to the post-office sometime during opening hours and suffer the queues there.

The reason I use the word "awkward" is that I feel like I'm misusing some facilities no matter what I do (expecting a receptionist to handle my packages, or making a postman bring a package all the way to my flat and then all the way back home and fill out forms etc).

These temp lockers are such a great idea.

Everyone in my office does this, although we don't have a dedicated receptionist and the job normally falls to the office manager instead. It doesn't even cross my mind as a misuse of company resources. Is this something that would be considered inappropriate in other places?

It could be that this is all fine and I'm overthinking it - so maybe take what I"m saying with a pinch of salt :-)

The problem though is that most of the time I can not choose the delivery company, and I've only seen La Poste having the lockers.

Just flash the barcode from the email, and it opens the appropriate locker. It even lets you open multiple ones with a single barcode if you received multiple packages the same day.

So :

* small company where everyone takes care of (his own) deliveries: OK.

* smallish company company where there is a receptionist: OK because it does not happen too often.

* middle-sized company: not OK.

* large company with a dedicated mail/parcel/delivery service: I guess it depends on formal work agreements.

Room 40 was a bench behind the warehouse reception.

Of course, there are potential pitfalls here - say, assuming your colleagues to be honest, for instance - but to the best of my knowledge, we never lost a parcel in years. (Which is more than could be said for anything entering the murky depths of our ERP system...)

I have found ordering from B&M's via their websites and picking the thing up at the store bypasses this whole problem.

And anyway you may not want everyone to know what you are buying.

When your package is damaged, some will even offer to add a note to your delivery, without you asking, in case there's a problem later.

I order very regularly from Amazon, and I think I have never had a single problem receiving packages this way, and it's pretty easy to find one on your way from work or somewhere that suits you. Some of them are even open on Sunday, depending on what their main business is, very convenient ...

We are planning a trip soon to investigate our insight.

This shitty company is the worst delivery one I know but for some reason Amazon France uses it to deliver to me (west of Paris).

I either get a "we were there" note when I was home, or nothing.

I complained to Amazon but it is maybe time to get it to social keyword with a #DropThatShittyCompany or something.