Taking in neighbour's parcels

[Reith]

I live in a friendly street. Some of us exchange Christmas cards, we take parcels in for each other etc.

Yesterday at about 10 am I reluctantly took in two parcels for the house opposite. Reluctant because this family never come to pick them up, and you end up going there about three times before you get an answer. (I watched the delivery man put a note through their door).

He works normal work hours, nothing unsociable. She is a SAHM to three primary school children. She walks them to and from school, past my house. She goes out in the car about once a day. Her car is parked outside my house. The oldest child is confident and old enough to pop across.

But why don't they come to collect?

So I think that's why it provokes a bit of a response in me, even though I'm not the one doing the errand, and I'm no longer 9 years old.

Gosh stop overthinking it and winding yourself up. Leave it in a corner until it's collected. Don't think about it until then. Moving forwards, tell delivery men 'they never come to collect and it's inconvenient for me, so i wont sorry..' Hold your ground. You have no obligation.

Taking parcels for delivery drivers isn't a favour - they get paid for their time either way. It's not cutting into their own time by having to redeliver. It's no 'favour' at all.

I'd wait until they decided to collect no matter how long it took them, its not your job to deliver, or just say no to taking in anymore parcels

Under your circumstances,I would stop taking the parcels to their house now, but if you have no room to store things,just go and tell them you are not accepting their stuff anymore. job done. These people seem like they just don't care, so that should be you as well.

Then take them over and they will be mortified and never want to see you again.

They're not exactly sociable as is.

Hang on! MrsN and dd are walking over as I type!

Nope, she walked past and got in the car.

I'd wait until they decided to collect no matter how long it took them, its not your job to deliver, or just say no to taking in anymore parcels

I think that this is where I'm at. I also like the idea of moving the parcels from my sight.

Well why didn't you go out and say something to her?? You just say - take the parcel now or I'm putting it out on the path.

Honestly, I'd have been throwing parcels out of the front door as soon as she appeared.

Put them on the bonnet of her car.

Partly because I'm sat upstairs at my keyboard eating some pasta and partly because of a perverse desire to not give in first this time.

I asked a delivery guy for neighbours to write on his note to collect from our porch & they'd fetched it next time I looked. Saved the 4-5 days of trying to catch them. Might have also sped them up if they didn't think it was secure enough there I suppose.

Do they have a chimney? I’d be inclined to scale their house at night and drop them down the chimney.

Or send them an official invoice charging them for parcel storage.

Dear Neighbour,

I am informing you that as of June 27th, 2019 there will be a daily storage charge of £5.00 per day for each single parcel not collected.

Items larger than a shoebox will occur an extra charge of 50p day.

This cost will rise to £7.00 and £7.50 after parcels have been stored on my premises for longer than three days.

Any parcels not collected after 10 days will be returned to sender.

If you require me to deliver a parcel at a pre arranges time there will be a charge of £3.00 rising to £5.00 if it’s raining. If you fail to be when the delivery is made you will be further billed £2.00 and delivery will have to be arranged again incurring the same charge again.

Cash only accepted.

Best wishes, xxx

Who are all these people who order and pay for things that they presumably want and then don't pick them up? It's so odd.

I am torn , I love the idea of writing something embarrassing on the package and leaving it on their doorstep or , sticking a note through the door with a list of charges .
If it's not getting in your way I would keep it and not answer the door they came for it .
Or just dump it on their doorstep .

I love that Soola.

Update. MrN has just opened the door to a takeaway.

Mine get thrown over the side gate
The parcel this afternoon got thrown over with a note stating it too

Put a sign up on your door saying? ‘Please only deliver parcels for this address’

I excitedly opened the door to a delivery I thought was for me, no, it was for the druggie scum neighbours who make my life hell. ‘It’s for Druggie Scum, will you take it?’ ‘..no, I hate them’. delivery guy laughed and chucked it back in his van. If you aren’t expecting a parcel, don’t answer the door, if you are and it’s consumer products for your slob neighbour, say ‘no.’ I feel sorry for the delivery people too, but my hatred of my neighbours pulls rank.

I would rather my neighbours did say no to taking in my parcels. I work funny and long hours so the window to go and collect from neighbours is small and they're also often out and it often means I have to wait days before I actually get things. I'd much prefer a card and the chance to rearrange delivery for a date when I am in. Also I don't want to actually have to make grateful small talk with people. I am a bit of a Grinch.

I would be so irritated by this I'd dump them on my doorstep.

Day 4. Thought MrsN was coming then, she walked across the street with the youngest toddling towards my front gate... and then veered off down the pavement to her car.

Both parcels are for MrN, so I wonder if she doesn't collect them out of principle?

My DH took a parcel in for a neighbour once as the delivery driver didn't want to put it back in the car, it was a Zimmer frame! We had it for the two week Easter break as they had gone on holiday

Maybe the note has got lost? This does happen quite often at our house (lots of people coming and going, gets kicked out of the way). I understand why YOU don't want to take them over in your specific circumstances, but I'm not really on the side of Team Petty MNers who refuse to ever take parcels to someone's house On Principle. Here we do it if we get a chance, or sometimes the neighbours knock first. It's probably 50:50. Nothing that needs to be made into a big thing.

Four days? That’s ridiculous. Either she hid the card from him and he doesn’t know he has parcels or he is a twat.

I would now put a letter through his door addressed just to him when she’s out.

Dear Mr.

I’ve had your parcels for four days now. I will return to sender tomorrow if you don’t come and get them.

From xxx

I might carefully remove the address label and make a new one but change his name to

Mr D Head.

Normally I end up taking them over tinierclanger and you end up going two or three times until they get around to answering. (I presume that with three youngsters they can't always get to the door). It takes up so much fucking headspace and I am determined not to give in this time.

The parcels are Prime, so I think that means they'll have got a text/email with my house number on in addition to the card?