To call of this postman/woman's job?

[roadkillbunny]

Sorry this may be long I want to try and give all the information.

My Mum bought some new house phones for us for Christmas, she ordered them from BT clearance through there ebay shop on our ebay account using her paypal.

The phones were ordered on Christmas eve, by the 12th of January we still hadn't received them so DH contacted the BT shop and was told they had been dispatched by parcel force reordered delivery on the 4th of January but due to weather and Christmas we should expect a delay and hopefully get them soon.
With still no show by mid-afternoon today, the 17th DH contacted BT again to be told that they had contacted Royal Mail who told them the parcel had been delivered and signed for on the 7th of January and they gave him the tracking number so he could look for himself.

DH emailed me the tracking number and copies of all the emails between him and BT so I could take a look at the so called delivery details. As soon as I saw the signature that had been given for delivery I knew it wasn't mine, it was my initial and surname but it was not my signature, nothing like it. I also checked the date and time and at the time they say it was delivered I was out at toddler group.

So at this point we have a missing parcel, a forged signature and are told that it is the sender (the BT shop) that need to contact royal mail to try and get to the bottom of it while we are left with no goods and short the cost.

Just after I put the children to bed a friend called me and I told her the whole sorry saga and she asks is it possible that it could have been left somewhere as nobody was in when the tried to deliver, I wrack my brain and the only place I could think of the bin by the porch so after I get off the phone I go and look in the bin (it isn't used any more as we got switched to wheelie bins 6 weeks ago and I haven't been to the dump yet)
and low and behold laying at the bottom of my old dirty bin is the package.

The package was in one of those plastic postage bags and the bin it'self didn't have any festering rubbish so luckily the wet and dirt hasn't got in although I haven't opened the parcel yet as I want to keep everything as it was until I am able to contact Royal Mail tomorrow.

I am really angry about the whole thing, not only did the postman leave my parcel in a bin (not a designated place we have ever told them to use and there are at least 2 neighbours on the close I know where in at that time on that day) without a card through the door to tell us that it was there but the thing that has made me the most angry, my signature was forged, last time I checked I am pretty sure that is fraud and illegal.

When I call to complain tomorrow would it be unreasonable for me to call for the person who forged my signature to be sacked?
I am going to insist that a formal investigation takes place and I am kept informed on it's outcomes, I will not be fobbed off with being asked to simply complete a complaints form (quite happy to fill in a formal written complaint but I want to be reassured that action will be taken).
Also would it be unreasonable if I feel Royal Mail don't take this seriously to inform the police? Surely it is against the law to forge a signature?
I am quite sure this wouldn't have been our normal postman as he in the past has either left things with neighbours or put a card through for pick up at depot, I am thinking this may have been a parcel force delivery driver.
I am going to inform the BT shop of all this as I feel they may also want to make a complaint, after all they paid for a service that wasn't given.

I would not care. If I got my mail and it was in tact and as expected I would not care. It's not like anyone forged your signature to clear your bank account. They did it to save you the hassle of the trip to the P.O.

I agree with you OP. I too am surprised that so many people don't mind their signature being forged by a postman who simply can't be arsed to deal with a parcel that requires a signature.

People who don't mind it, the Postie is not doing you a favour, he's saving himself time! Maybe if they have asked you personally if you mind them doing this, it's ok for them to bend the rule a little. But for them to decide on someone elses behalf that their signature should be forged and their parcel stuck in a bin is disgusting. If you broke the rules that much in any other job you'd get the sack, or at least a formal warning.

The fact that postmen do this so regularly makes a mockery of the Royal Mail, they are abusing the service that they offer! The whole company needs to crack down on it, but they don't. They are safe in the knowledge that they have the monopoly on the industry, so they feel they can charge their customers for a service they blatantly can't be arsed to deliver.

The only person who could have signed the thing was the postman, I know every single person on my small close, no of them would sign my name and stick it in a bin, I also know non of them have taken anything in for me recently or signed for anything and put it in the bin so else forged my signature, a helpful bugler who came into my house, took nothing but forged my name on answering to the postman?

As we believed the parcel was missing I had no reason to check anywhere as I had no card or note, it sat in the bin for 10 days, only today when I found out they claimed it had been delivered and signed for did I know I had a reason to be thinking about the fact it may be somewhere outside my house.

The postman may have thought he was doing me some kind of favour but it is not within his rights to make that kind of decision for me, if in the past I had said to him 'If I am not home just sign for it yourself and stick it in the bin' then it wouldn't be a problem (although if my signature was forged it would still be wrong).

I am calming down a bit now and I know am coming over in parts as way OTT, I wouldn't call the police unless Royal Mail refused to even look into it and even then it wouldn't be the police I would contact but postwatch the consumer watchdog for the royal mail, I guess the point I was trying to get across poorly with the police and sacking remarks was that forging someone's signature is fraud and illegal.

He might be saving himself time but the end result is you getting your stuff without added travelling/money spent. Glass hlaf full people would call this a win/win situation. Other people would call it FRAUD and ORF WITH THEIR HEADS.

You'd have an argument if you'd found out the parcel had gone in the bin and been collected and thrown away with the rubbish and you were battling to prove you didn't sign for it.

But you have your phones, presumably when you open them they will be fine.

I don't really understand why you are expending so much unnecessary energy on this. Be a bit peeved and mention it to the postie or RM, but you are getting yourself in a silly state over nothing.

I once had a parcel chucked over the fence into the back garden, I didn't know it was there and it got rained on. But it was a hairdryer diffuser, it wasn't broken or ruined, so I just moved on.

You need to do the same.

Childish, but LOL at 'helpful bugler' :o

The handy tuba player and obliging oboe-ist were next door, waiting in for the boiler repair man

YANBU to pursue this, I have had my signature faked in the past and also had a parcel left in the bin - unfortunately though my bin was empty at the time the postman decided to put the parcel in it wasn't when Royal Mail finally told us where it had been left about 6 days later as both DS and I had thrown rubbish in there. I'd rather arrange a redelivery than have to rummage through a bin half through of rubbish any day!

It might be hard to prove who put it in the bin but the fake signature is illegal and should be followed up (though without pointing the finger at any one individual)

Although it may not seem too bad here - in my case it was legal documents that were signed as delivered when they hadn't been and caused me a lot of hassle as it did for the people who had sent them.

GreenEyesandHam, you have made me laugh, I missed that typo, I now have images of a a marching band coming out my house on parade forging my signature for the postman on the way past!

I am going to bed, I am calmer but I will be complaining tomorrow, yes I have my goods but that doesn't make what happened right. I will not be saying that the postman forged my signature just that my signature was forged, I will have a quick chat will all my neighbours again over it to double check one of them didn't do it even though I know they didn't for lots of reasons that are too long an dull to go into here but if I talk to them again I can tell Royal Mail that it wasn't signed by a neighbour. I will be pushing for a formal investigation, some of you may see this as fine as it might save you a trip but it would be handy if a friend robbed a bank and gave me some cash, wouldn't make it right though would it.

You're likening robbery to someone signing for your mail?

They probably won't investigate - or they may say they will - and you'll get an apology.

That is all. You need to chill out.

Just to possibly save you being passed around when you ring to complain; Dh works in a post office and said if it is in a Parcel Force package it was delivered by Parcel Force so it's them you need to complain to (0844 800 4466), not Royal Mail.

He also said that this is quite common with parcel force as the drivers are self employed and paid on the number of parcels they deliver. He said it's quite rare for parcel force packages to be returned to the depot because of this.

"I will be pushing for a formal investigation, some of you may see this as fine as it might save you a trip but it would be handy if a friend robbed a bank and gave me some cash, wouldn't make it right though would it."

Reality check for table number 2, please...

I think demanding a sacking is a bit harsh but can understand your annoyance. I used to work on the customer service line for an internet mail order company so had to deal with missing parcels and heard stories like this from customers on a very regular basis. Unfortunatley if you want the PO to take you seriously you will have to keep at them like a dog with a bone.

I had a parcel at Christmas shoved down by our shed, it didn't need signing for, no note was put through the door although I later went through the recycling and found a tiny what I assume said "by shed" written in pencil on the back of a Christmas card envelope.

This wouldn't be so bad if i didn't live less than 100m directly opposite the sorting office and collection depot. (And I do mean directly opposite as DS loves to watch the Postman Pat's sorting the post in their big glass sorting office from his bedroom window in the morning)

Demanding a sacking is a bit harsh but what if the OP had never seen the parcel in the bin or if it had gone in the bin wagon?

Would BT have reimbursed her or sent a replacement if there was a signature?

It's happened to me and since there was a signature they told me to go whistle.