Item sent Royal Mail signed for, item delivered and signature taken, customer says not received

Hello!

I sent an item on 13/01 with Royal Mail.
It was the signed for service as it was a £45 item.

I checked the tracking on yesterday and it showed as being delivered on 16/01 - with a signature.
The signature, although illegible, had the name of the customer printed beneath.

Today the customer has been in touch to ask if I have a tracking number for the parcel as it hasn’t arrived yet!

Not really sure whaf to do.

Sarah x

I had this once with a tracked item to Australia, as I had used an insured signed service and the item had been paid by paypal, paypal decided in my favour and let me keep the money. Luckily in my case the customer was understanding that I had done all I could and I think managed to get refunded through the credit card she had used - then ordered the items again and had them sent to her work address.

Initially I would send the tracking nr as requested and she can look at the signature, perhaps someone else at the address signed and has forgotten to hand it over.

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Send them the tracking number and mention that when you checked the royal mail website there was a signature so could they check if their postie had signed on their behalf and left the item in a safe place (or if it was sent to a work place get them to check with the mail room). As Deborah says this should be covered by paypal’s seller protection if they cannot track down the parcel.

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It might be genuine.
On the other hand, there are a few dishonest people who try to recoup their Christmas spending by claiming for items as not received. I would reply politely that Yes the parcel was tracked, and has been delivered and signed for, and suggest they ask their family / neighbour where they have put the parcel.
You will probably never hear from them again, and they’ll go try it on with somebody else.

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Thank you.
I’m just concerned that it’s going to get nasty as the signature states the buyer’s name underneath.

I had something similar and a neighbour had kindly taken in the parcel then forgot about it - the post office had got the signature of the kindly lady who said she would let the person know she had the parcel. Eventually Royal Mail sent me a copy of the signature and from that the customer worked out which neighbour it was - very worrying and upsetting at the time but it did sort itself out.

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On double checking the proof of delivery it clearly shows a signature and the buyer’s surname below it.
However, above it states ‘‘Latest update: Delivered to your address or a neighbour’’

This concerns me slightly as normally it would state one or the other?

The problem is that the signature has the buyer’s surname printed underneath, and not a neighbour’s.

I always send my items signed for so I’ve just checked the most recent batch and all have ‘latest update: delivered to your address or a neighbour’ so I think that is standard.

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Thank you - I thought it may be the postman hedging his betsand covering all options :slight_smile:

I would just politely reply with the facts by saying when it was sent, how it was sent, where it was sent to. Then state that you’ve checked with RM and it says it was signed for on so and so date and give your customer the tracking number and the link to RM track and trace, so they can see the info for themselves. Then wait until you hear back from them x

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Just to update, the item turned up with a neighbour!

Whew :slight_smile:

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Since a parcel I sent was mislaid for a few days causing me to panic I now add this “signature” to the email I always send out thanking for the order and saying when I will be posting. :

-Please note that my packages don’t go through the letterbox. I always post first class so if it hasn’t arrived after a couple of days Please check any safe place where it might have been left

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