to name and shame companies who do not know that the Scottish Highlands are part of mainland UK - HERE?

[idonotliveonanisland]

Well here goes. The company I would like to choose first is one of Mumsnet's partners, so I'd better not just now.

So instead my first name and shame goes to Wincanton Home Delivery, as used by Argos and Homebase (and Comet, anyone?) whose staff have yet to learn that the delivery date they quote is NOT the delivery date we get. It is merely the delivery date to a local contractor who may take another week to deliver to our home.

Wincanton Home Delivery, as used by Argos and Homebase - train your staff properly and stop promising a service you do not deliver.

[MackerelOfFact]

I'm a Londoner and have never been to the Highlands (lovely though it looks) but this just seems ridiculous. The UK isn't a large country - I wonder what charges are like within places like Australia and Hong Kong where distance and islands must be much more of a problem?

I don't agree that you should just have to lump it because you live in the Highlands. It's not like you all live in huts up a mountain with a yak tethered outside.

[stubbornhubby]

why would you not pay for delivery?
I don't expect smoked salmon to be the same price in london as it is in Scotland..

[Dylthan]

But that's the point smoked salmon would be the same price regardless of where you live so would whiskey and even more infuriatingly you pay less at the petrol pumps despite the north sea oil rigs

If you feel that it's only remote areas that should pay more than that would not apply to the whole of the highlands but would apply to very remote areas in say Wales, cornwell, Yorkshire why is it only the highlands of Scotland that are discriminated against? Why do you think that this is acceptable?

How can you be so spectacularly missing the point?

[KnittedBreast]

the reason those companies will not deliver to the highlands is because they cannot guarantee to do so within a set delivery time. also if they only have a couple of people in that area wanting something delivered it costs too much money to deliver especially if delivery with the company is free.

The company i work for has stopped using DHL as they keep stealing our stock, or it arrives very damaged/late etc... I wouldnt go near DHL personally

[Ineedacleaneriamalazyslattern]

But like someone said on either this thread or the other one, the H&I's are actually an area that has always relied on catalogue then internet shopping not always because they are remote but because there isn't the same selection of shops in places like Inverness (a city) or Wick (a rather large town actually)
These are sellers almost bread and butter buyers but now with the massive explosion of Internet shopping they are the ones being penalised.

Like I have also said several times those who live in London would charge me more to deliver 25 miles away from Inverness but if I sent the same parcel to London I wouldn't incur the extra charge the distance for the parcel covered is the same in both directions and someone still has to come out of Inverness to collect the parcel or drop it off so why does it cost more one way and not the other?

[maighdlin]

A NI girl here who is pissed off by this!

I love ebay and buy loads of stuff on it but it drives me MAD when people insist on charging me extra to have my items delivered to NI when they are using Royal fecking Mail. Royal Mail costs the exact same to send something to london as belfast, but these sneaky bastards think they can charge me an extra £5 just because I am from NI. I tell them to fuck off and cancel my sale and report it to ebay. Its so annoying you are all happy and have paid and then you get an email through asking for more money, and then they get cheeky with me when i refuse! scamming bastards.


Shall we start a lobby group to introduce a UK wide flat postage cost bill?

[Ineedacleaneriamalazyslattern]

And I do appreciate that it isn't cost effective to deliver a few parcels over a wide area at the time and I lived on one of the Islands as a child yet my mum still managed to catalogue shop that's delivery cost was not prohibitive.
We maybe waited a few extra days for things until they were collected off the ferry and delivered but we still got them and actually it was much easier as we knew exactly what day they would be coming on not anytime in the next week sometime between 8 and 6.

[bigbeagleeyes]

Yes, I agree that the H&I have used catalogues for years before the internet. And I have another bugbear. We are 60 miles from Inverness and to do a big Tesco shop is a whole day affair. I know so many people in this very scattered community that would happily pay a little extra do have an Internet shop delivered, say one designated day a week?
I'm sure it would be worth their while, they'd probably even make a profit.

[CrystalQueen]

Don't have any naming and shaming but just wanted to add my general irritation with this. I saw an earlier post that included DD postcodes - I live in Dundee and it is most definitely NOT remote. It is on the main trunk road north. Grrr.

I worry about this whenever privatisation of the Royal Mail is on the news.

[KnittedBreast]

big- thats right. but company x cannot guarantee that a large amount of people are going to use this service without fail once a week. because of this its too expensive to deliver there. the company i work has free delivery everywhere except ni and some parts of scotland and isles but when they have to deliver or collect even close by to where they are based they often lose money or run as a loss. if this was to be extended if would cost to much. when you ask a delivery company to deliver or collect somehting they look at the time it will take, milage and what jobs they will be missing out on to deliver to the remote area instead and then charge based on these thing. small companies in particular cannot afford their own delviery van (due to running costs and insurance based on milage useage) and so use couriers and are at the mercy of these companies.

[Tigurr]

I wonder what charges are like within places like Australia and Hong Kong where distance and islands must be much more of a problem?



I think as a rule most places charge extra to deliver to remote/rural parts of Australia... going to go and check now (I live in Sydney so don't tend to notice the extra charges as they don't affect me )

[Tigurr]

The Aussie branch of ELC:

What does delivery cost?
We have a standard delivery charge of $15 for most orders, no matter how many products it includes or where it is going in Australia. Gift voucher only orders have no delivery charge.

The exceptions are some of our heavier items will have an extra charge added. You will see the extra charge in the detailed description of the product.

Also some products such as Treehouse furniture and other playground equipment will have higher delivery costs - most of these items are call to order so our Phone Sales team will give you a delivery quote and delivery time.

The total delivery charge is shown before you finish the checkout process.
Every now and then some large deliveries to remote areas may cost more. One of our Direct Sales staff will contact you and discuss the extra charge prior to dispatch. These are usually deliveries to areas that Australia Post Parcel will not deliver.

[Milngavie]

I honestly am stunned at those missing the point of this.

Why should some UK citizens be 'punished' for where they live? Especially when many English and Welsh people live in equally rural areas?

Where I live is classed as H&I but is in fact further South than Glasgow!

[Ineedacleaneriamalazyslattern]

I agree Milngavie, knitted says: when you ask a delivery company to deliver or collect somehting they look at the time it will take

Yep exactly so why does it cost me less to post a parcel to London than it would cost to receive the same parcel from London?
It doesn't cost anymore in petrol, insurance etc. to collect something from me than it does to deliver it to me.

[Dylthan]

highland news article

Fed ex charge extra to deliver to any where north of Perth despite having a depot in Inverness.

[MarisSkye]

I don't mind a Highlands and Islands surcharge so long as it's reasonable, what I object to is having to pay a helluva lot more to cross the bridge to Skye.

Worst example are the couriers used by a polytunnel company (the company itself is great and have tried arguing on my behalf, so I'm not goinig to name them):

Free delivery to most of UK

£15 to Highlands

£95 to islands, including Skye. So I can get polytunnel delivered to Kyle of Lochalsh for £15, yet ask for it to be DRIVEN another 20 miles or so sets me back another £80!!!!!

Explain that if you can!

[HighHeidYin]

dylthan when a company says postage is 'free', it isn't actually. They just add the price of the delivery to the cost of the goods and charge the one price, rather than listing the goods and delivery charge separately.

No company can offer 'free' delivery because they have to actually pay for the courier charges.

So if the courier company is charging extra on top of the normal delivery charge, this has to be charged separately.

Does that make sense?

Postal charges to NI should be absolutely no different to the rest of the UK so if a company tries to charge you more you should query it!

[TapselteerieO]

Forbidden Planet - they wanted to charge me £20 delivery for an order that cost £20 (I went with Voga who are a lovely Edinburgh based company with great customer service).

I was going to put the book people on here too, but see it has been added - my Mum lives 12 miles west of my address and got her delivery free, no I don't live in the highlands and I shouldn't be getting charged extra .

[TapselteerieO]

To all those saying lump it - companies that want our money need to start using Royal Mail then we would not be discriminated against for our postcodes, but more importantly most of us are not living anywhere that is inaccessible/remote, but are being penalised for living anywhere other than Edinburgh or Glasgow in Scotland.

We are not asking for much when we don't want to be overcharged for postage.

[Dylthan]

I know that the couriers are still paid I'm not stupid but thanks for that

The point is that charging extra to the h&i is wrong regardless of whether postage for the rest of the uk is usually £4.95 or "free" that's the point of this thread.

[notpythagoras]

Um, how can it be wrong to charge extra if it costs the supplier more to provide the service? I agree with Stubhub that if it were possible to deliver more cheaply to you in Scotland than you are currently charged, then firms would come in and undercut the existing couriers. If that isn't happening then the extra you are paying must be for an enhanced service (delivery hundreds of miles from the distribution depot). Nobody is putting up barriers to your custom out of spite, it is a purely commercial decision. There is no moral dimension to this: no "unfairness" or "discrimination". It is not "wrong"....it's what it costs!

You have to pay over £1million quid in my area for a 4 bedroomed house whereas you can probably buy one for half that in Glascow yet I am not expecting YOU to subsidise the difference. So why should Londoners subsidise YOUR delivery to Scotland?

Um, I know currently the rest of us subsidise ordinary postal deliveries in rural areas but that's another issue.

Let the market rule.

[Dylthan]

It dosen't cost the couriers more fed ex have a depot in Inverness yet still add a surcharge on to deliveries to Inverness.

If it costs more to deliver to rural areas of Scotland than it would cost more to deliver to rural areas of England and Wales.

Couriers get away with charging more because ignorant people think it costs more so that makes it acceptable

Not all companies charge extra so it is possible unfortunately companies don't give us the choice of what courier is used.

[Dylthan]

And letting the Market rule is the why this thread was started so we could name and shame companies and vote with our feet to not use them and instead use companies that actually care about their highland customers.

[IShallWearMidnight]

Friend of my parents ordered something , it was sent to Aberdeen then transferred to Inverness then delivered to her. They charged her extra because she has an IV postcode and therefore it had to come from the Inverness depot. Similar to most delivery companies, yes?
Except the lorry which took it to Inverness drove straight past her front door as she lives directly on the A96. Apparently it was impossible for them to deliver from Aberdeen as she lived in a remote area. Couldn't understand that being directly on the transfer route couldn't possibly be "remote".

[HighHeidYin]

Errrr.. I wasn't saying you were stupid. fwiw I am on your side...