Yesterday, Keith was waiting for an order so that he could go and do a job. This order should have arrived on Tuesday but didn't and, after waiting in vain until ten o'clock for the postman, he set off to do another job. I stayed in to wait for the post and by half past eleven, he had walked purposefully down the road, past our house and back up the other side of the road. No delivery for us.
In the afternoon, we popped out for half an hour and luckily, were back just in time to catch the parcel postman putting one of their nice 'You were out' cards through our letterbox. (By the way, these nice red cards are now nice blue cards with snowflakes on them - just for Christmas!)
For some time now, as UK readers will know, delivery times have been erratic. No longer can you plan your day, safe in the knowledge that the post will arrive at the same time every day - important for people like Keith who rely on being able to order keys and transponders and being confident that they will arrive when they should. Now, the post can arrive any time during the working day and varies greatly from one day to the next. According to yesterday's postman, our area now has a new manager who is bringing in more changes. Deliveries will be even more erratic, things that you think should come with the letter delivery, may be put in with the parcel delivery, which may, in turn, no longer be within half an hour of the letter delivery but could be hours later.
So, it seems that my new career will be waiting in for the post for anything from a couple of hours to all day - just in case. Sorry, dogs, your walks are on on hold!
"Ah," I hear you say, "but you can go to the sorting office for your package if you miss it."
Well, it's not too far away from us luckily, but if you go by car, you are now not allowed to park in their car park, which means finding a pay and display space somewhere in the car parks nearby and you can now no longer go on the same day, as it will not have been processed. So you lose a day.
'Ring up and ask for a re-delivery then!" you exclaim.
Previously, I could ring up and speak to someone at the local sorting office. Now, I can only ring up and speak to a computer, which requires me to give it an endless stream of irrelevant information, like what colour underwear I have on. (No, OK, that's not one of the questions, but I bet it will be soon!)
Last time I tried it, I gave up in despair.
However, if you thought it could get no worse, cast your eyes over what's happening to Canada's mail service. Over there, they are talking about giving up door to door deliveries altogether.
Just wait till our new, sleek privatised service gets a load of that!
I'm taking bets on how long it takes Royal Mail to follow suit.
