To ask you...no, to BEG you...

[Yesitsbess]

Put your house numbers on your house people!

I lost my hospitality job during the lockdown and, as many people have had to, took up a delivery job to make ends meet. I have learned that delivery drivers are grumpy for a reason! Those reasons are numerous.

If you want to help us out for reasons that include: our safety, our being able to park safely, our being able to make the insane time targets we are set by our companies, our not wasting fuel looking for you (both environmentally and efficiency-wise) and you just getting your food/parcels/taxis on-time then please have a look at the following:

1. God tier - people with GIANT NUMBERS IN LIGHTS on their houses AND BINS ( we love you, especially if we deliver after dark) even if we're not delivering to your house, we use you as navigation because Googlemaps is shite.

1. Mid-tier - people who live somewhere hard-to-find but include directions on their order. Your street has 'odds and evens'. You have your number on your door in a colour that is discernible in the dark.

1. Poo-tier - people who live on a New build estate where the developer assigned house numbers by THROWING A CALCULATOR AT A CEILING FAN, and yet they think Google maps will see us right. It will not and we hate you.

1. Hell Tier - people who live on a main road, with long drives spanning off said main road, with NO indication of what house number/name they are at he end of their drive...

1. Seventh circle of Hell tier - you live very rurally and don't provide directions. Or in a very difficult to access place, or you have insane building works on the path, your dog is horrible (please stop your dogs humping and/or biting us - we're on minimum wage, we don't care if he "never does this usually!")

Anyway, if you've read this and think "We're golden!" on this issue, drive around your neighbouring roads at night and try to pick a random number to find - it's a fun game and might help you see what we see?

PUT NUMBERS ON YOUR HOUSES PEOPLE!

Oh God I'm awful. I live in a funny shaped street and don't have a door number on my gate or on my door om my gate I have an old rusty 4 from 43 the 3 fell off. I do have it sprayed on my bins in luminous yellow paint but that's no good as you can't see them behind my fence. I promise next time I'm shopping I'm going to buy some new numbers for my gate. Just for you since you begged nicely

@Chocolatier9 what about a rock ? As in not attached to the building in the flower bed / by the gate / in the hedge.

We have large numbers on our bins, number on the wall, number on the front door. Deliveries still go next door (who also have numbers everywhere) or over the road. Don't know what else we can do.

@Chocolatier9

I’m moving to a rural area this week. House has a name but no number. It’s listed so I can’t put the name or a light on the outside There are strict rules about putting the bins out.

I’m going to die there alone, choking on a cold takeaway because the ambulance can’t find my house, aren’t I?

Takeaway deliveries are not a thing for rural folk, you go to the chippy van instead on the nights it is in your village, or pick up takeaway from the pub (having a pint while they make it in non-Covid times) or village shop (we have an Indian shopkeeper and she makes amazing curries! She will sell you a bottle of wine to go with it, and a chocolate bar and a lottery ticket because she can too.) The one time I have ever needed an ambulance, the paramedic knew exactly where to come, he’d been here when the old lady who lived here before us died.

Rural communities are very different to urban communities. The culture clash happens when someone not used to the way things work expects them to work in a different way. No one who lives near me minds that we are not allowed name signs on our tracks - the forest looks far nicer for not having loads of random signs everywhere.

I understand the frustration delivery drivers must feel though when they can’t find somewhere. I had a paper round when I was a teenager in a very rural place, and every one of my 50+ drops had no number and very few of them had a sign. I just had to learn where everything was. For frustrated delivery drivers, What3Words is amazing and will literally take you to someone’s doorstep. Now, if only Amazon had a place on their delivery instructions form for a What3Words address!

Im in a new build.
I put instructions on my orders
I have updated google maps to show our correct location as it was showing at some flats at the end of our road
I have updated both uber eats and deliveroo to show to correct location on my address
My door number is visible.

Delivery drivers still park at the flats and go into the security desk. They have to drive past my house to go there.

I dont know what else to do. Ive had so many delivery drivers annoyed at me but im like what maps are you using????

I feel for the poor delivery drivers where I live.

Small estate with 2 roads in and houses on a walkway in between the 2 roads. One road is numbered all the way from 1-30, my walk is odds in one side and events on the other. Satnav brings everyone to one specific house, regardless of the postcode you enter.

To access my house, you drive down a small road, but it looks like a dead end at the bottom. It isn’t, you can turn left into the parking area.

It’s a brilliant place to live if you want your children to play outside safely - lots of wide paths and little traffic, but it is a bugger to find.

I always put instructions on for deliveries and have a house number. As I am the first house nearest to the parking area, I get lots of people knocking on my door asking for directions to other houses.

We actually had a delivery driver say thank you to us at the weekend as our house number is in BIG silver numbers which have some sort of in-built LED backlight thing behind them so really easy to see.

I thought they were a bit in your face when DH wired them in but the amount of people who have since said they use our house as a guide at night, like your post!

My driveway is long as hell and we have various little off-shoots that go towards fields and outbuildings so I built a safety box for deliveries to go in and painted our house number and name on the side and left a contact number. AND I made signs to direct y'all to the main house just in case... am I in the delivery driver/emergency service good books now?

@Tomatobear I'm glad it's making you as happy as it's making me!

@PivotPivotPivottt (cackling at username) you will be thrilled to learn that Poundland is now selling durable, stick on numbers! I have definitely not considered buying loads and numbering peoples' houses in a passive aggressive manner. Not me. Nope.

And 87 Besspoints to you for doing something about it

@ScarletZebra I am also stumped. But you get 99 Besspoints for all your lovely numbers.

I get you , I am a community nurse , sometimes albeit rare , I have to find new patient in the dark , recently I had a brand new build in a small town postcode not recognised on sat nav , local shop never heard of the street , took me 2 hrs to track it and that was only because the patients daughter called into the patient when I made the third phone call to the property .

Nothing more frustrating .

I have a note in my phone with detailed instructions. Along the lines of left at the roundabout (there is only one...), up the hill, after the oak tree look for the next turning on the left and that’s the top of the drive etc. But it only works when there’s space and time to do it.

In an emergency, the local first responder is here very quickly, but last time the ambulance spent 20 minutes driving in circles around the village (they didn’t call, we’d have driven down and piloted them in). I can only assume dispatch didn’t pass on the detailed directions. I’m going to use what 3 words if I have to call an ambulance again.

Thank you @Yesitsbess and @steppemum. I shall look for something suitable.

You may have saved me from a lonely death...

@Backinthebox I can assure you that takeaways are a thing for the rural people round here! I spend a lot of time avoiding curious farm animals whilst tramping across fields with snacks about my person. Goats are the worst.

@SplendidSuns1000

@guessthatswhytheycallittheblue we all love you, you are a beacon

@Doodle2021 I'm not sure what to suggest but you're super for doing all that. I bet other delivery drivers use you for navigation.

I'd like to thank not only my mother and father, but my parents too. Oh I promised myself I wouldn't cry! Thank you to my manager, my publicist, Jenny from HR. You're all incredible and I'd be nowhere without you.

@SplendidSuns1000 I did a proper LOL then.

Oh dear, I think we fall into one of your less appealingly titled categories. We're along a track, off a main A road with only a tiny sign sticking out of the hedgerow.
I have been meaning to replace the sign since we moved here. I will take your plea as a kick up the 'arris to get on with sorting a better sign out.
All the best OP.

@InsufferablePerformanceFather LOVING your work! Put lights on it, I'm thinking Vegas, I'm thinking Jean Michelle-Jarre, I'm thinking Blackpool.

@InsufferablePerformanceFather With fireworks, backing dancers and a tiny dog in a tutu!

My old road had the worst numbering system ever. I was 87, next door was 22, and the other side was 41C. I still don't know what happened to 41A and 41B, they were nowhere to be seen. New post delivery people used to stand looking confused

[quote SplendidSuns1000]@InsufferablePerformanceFather With fireworks, backing dancers and a tiny dog in a tutu![/quote]
Yes sir!

[quote Yesitsbess]@InsufferablePerformanceFather LOVING your work! Put lights on it, I'm thinking Vegas, I'm thinking Jean Michelle-Jarre, I'm thinking Blackpool.[/quote]
Brilliant

I feel you op. I had to deliver 6, yes only 6 parcels to my dds friends for a lockdown birthday zoom call.

It took me fucking hours! We live rurally.

I have another tier for you

Tier - fucking house names

Driving down dark, unlit rural roads trying to find houses call ShazTrace or whatever stupid mixtures of names with no idea where the house is and no sign to tell you which said stupid house name is

@harknesswitch we have a Bamanda.

BAMANDA.

It cracks me up every time I have to go there.

OP I have just stuck giant white numbers on both our bins in honour of you after realising we are could be in mid tier (I give very good directions where possible but house is difficult to find as the front has no vehicle access!). We're still hard to find but the bins will hopefully help if driving (unless it's bin day when we have to drag them up the road to be collected). Our front is easy if you're on foot, and if you can find the footpath as there are only houses on one side and normal numbering 1-28 (with a few abc in but they make sense!).

I live in one of your bell zones. Mostly house names and no numbers, all Welsh, house names impossible to find, the odd mini Terrace of numbered houses halfway up a differently named street...
I do lots of directing!