Parcel Motel Thread (post all related questions here)

fernrock

I found address pal very good especially during the parcel motel melt down.
You also have 5 days in which to collect at the same cost.
The only downside is it is only available for parcels from the UK.
No use if you need a parcel delivery internally and, you are likely to be away from your address.

animaal

Does anybody have a way to get a response from Parcel Motel?

They've had my package since 30th Dec. I've sent a number of support tickets since last week, with no response. Over the past couple of days I've also tried sending queries via Twitter, but got nothing back.

I can understand they might have been busy over Christmas, but we're in the second half of January and they're totally uncontactable.

Maybe I should just write it off as a bad experience and never use them again?

fernrock

Try 018835442

wotzgoingon

Anyone know what happens after a parcel motel customs officer inspects your parcel. I received the email with picture that my parcel was there on Saturday then Monday morning I received a second email stating that the customs officer was inspecting my parcel but I haven't since received a email stating if the package was destroyed or what.

I just thought they might let me know the situation.

Gadgetman496

Some other poster mentioned way back the 9.00am or first thing in the morning yielded more success when trying to reach them via phone. Apparently, anytime after that they simply ignore.

After the podcast with the two employees, it's obvious there is a lot of unrest internally that needs sorting out.

animaal

In the interests of fairness...

I called Parcel Motel, and they were very helpful. It turns out that my package was delivered, although neither the Parcel Motel tracking page nor Amazon's status page said so.

So Parcel Motel's service did work, it's just a pity there was no confirmation of it or response to any support requests.

deezell

Yes, Credit where its due. Most helpful when i rang during the xmas mayhem, and every thing arrived. Also Just ordered an oversize item at 6.00 pm on Wednesday evening from the UK, free UK delivery. 63 kilos and 1.3m long. Got an alert at 2.00 pm that it's ready for pickup in the Northside depot. Thats not even 2 days, and for 7 euros.

Riva10

deezell wrote: »

Yes, Credit where its due. Most helpful when i rang during the xmas mayhem, and every thing arrived. Also Just ordered an oversize item at 6.00 pm on Wednesday evening from the UK, free UK delivery. 63 kilos and 1.3m long. Got an alert at 2.00 pm that it's ready for pickup in the Northside depot. Thats not even 2 days, and for 7 euros.

animaal wrote: »

In the interests of fairness...

I called Parcel Motel, and they were very helpful. It turns out that my package was delivered, although neither the Parcel Motel tracking page nor Amazon's status page said so.

So Parcel Motel's service did work, it's just a pity there was no confirmation of it or response to any support requests.

Speaking from my own experiences with Parcel Motel when things go wrong they go badly wrong and communication is non existant and judging from the majority of posters on this thread, you appear to be the exception.

deezell

Riva10 wrote: »

Speaking from my own experiences with Parcel Motel when things go wrong and judging from the majority of posters on this thread, you appear to be the exception.

Sure Xmas parcels took forever, but they all arrived. I can't remember if the agent said they were arriving in at the daily rate of 10,000 or 100,000, either way the numbers were mind blowing. My only gripe was sometimes following depot scans parcels were taking two days to arrive in my motel. The reason? no empty cabinets as lots of people wait till the last minute to collect, clogging up the cabinets. PM offered some tasty daily raffle prizes for people who collected within 6-7 hours of the text alert to try and ease this. Also, who else will deliver a 63 Kilo two man parcel from the UK for €7? New addition is they've published a UK mobile number for sites who insist on a UK contact number, B&Q for one. On balance , they have my vote.

Riva10

deezell wrote: »

Sure Xmas parcels took forever, but they all arrived. I can't remember if the agent said they were arriving in at the daily rate of 10,000 or 100,000, either way the numbers were mind blowing. My only gripe was sometimes following depot scans parcels were taking two days to arrive in my motel. The reason? no empty cabinets as lots of people wait till the last minute to collect, clogging up the cabinets. PM offered some tasty daily raffle prizes for people who collected within 6-7 hours of the text alert to try and ease this. Also, who else will deliver a 63 Kilo two man parcel from the UK for €7? New addition is they've published a UK mobile number for sites who insist on a UK contact number, B&Q for one. On balance , they have my vote.

You can make all the excuses you like but being unable to contact Parcel Motel or get an answer via email or Facebook or Twitter is in my opinion a discrace. That and their discusting treatment of their employees by denying them their promised Christmas Bonus has insured that I will never again use their services again. There are far better choices out here now.

deezell

Riva10 wrote: »

You can make all the excuses you like but being unable to contact Parcel Motel or get an answer via email or Facebook or Twitter is in my opinion a discrace. That and their discusting treatment of their employees by denying them their promised Christmas Bonus has insured that I will never again use their services again. There are far better choices out here now.

Fair enough. The Xmas bonus thing I Know nothing about. As a public servant i'm taking home less pay than I did 10 years ago, but I get no sympathy for that either. As for contacting PM, very few companies can deal with email. I wouldn't wipe my a**e with poxy social media interfaces, they're for kids or US presidents to play with. I phoned them. I got an answer. From a human, and a nice polite Irish one at that.

Dubl07

Phoned yesterday morning about a parcel due in Belfast by the 16th. It wasn't in their system and the very nice girl advised me to raise a 'find my parcel' ticket. An email yesterday afternoon told me that it was in the Dublin depot. It went out to a local (overflow) locker last night and we collected it this morning.

fitzer1982

As people have said if your lucky you get a response, in my case thats not happened. It took me days to contact them and now its gone cold again and I still don't have my package. It's a joke to be honest, the entire idea of their service is supposed to be convenience, the effort I've gone to over this has now easily outweighed any saving I made on purchasing from the UK.

waylander2002

did u try and contact them on facebook, ive got fast responses with pms there

fitzer1982

Looks like it's resolved now, didn't try Facebook, I don't use much social media. I had to sign up to Twitter just to try contact them. Anyway fingers crossed they haven't managed to mess it up again but this is the last time I use them, great in concept but if something goes wrong, forget about it. Hopefully they realise the importance in customer service in the future, especially with brexit happening, god knows what opportunities will arise from that.

JG009

Is anyone elses email notifications not working??? I have missed numerous parcels because of this. Emailed them and no response.

* It is not just me and it is not a spam filter issue etc, the emails are just not being sent from PM once the items are stored like they should be.
Whats up?

nsa0bupkd3948x

JG009 wrote: »

Is anyone elses email notifications not working??? I have missed numerous parcels because of this. Emailed them and no response.

* It is not just me and it is not a spam filter issue etc, the emails are just not being sent from PM once the items are stored like they should be.
Whats up?

Emails are working fine for me. Had them last few days.

cheif kaiser

Has anyone else had an issue with Parcel Motel splitting their packages into 2 separate parcels and charging for 2? I ordered 2 mirrors recently which were shipped to parcel motel as 1 package under the one tracking number, however, when they got to parcel motel because the boxes were simply strapped together, parcel motel separated them and charged me for 2 parcels and because they are too big to fit into any of their boxes, both were classes as oversized and I had to pay €14 for them.

The same thing happened yesterday when I shipped them 2 paintings as 1 shipment but again because they were 2 boxes strapped together, they once again separated them and charged me €14.

I really don't think this is fair and I actually don't think they have the right to interfere with my parcels.

I did email them about the mirrors but they didn't bother to respond with any explanation.

Any opinions on this?

nsa0bupkd3948x

cheif kaiser wrote: »

Has anyone else had an issue with Parcel Motel splitting their packages into 2 separate parcels and charging for 2? I ordered 2 mirrors recently which were shipped to parcel motel as 1 package under the one tracking number, however, when they got to parcel motel because the boxes were simply strapped together, parcel motel separated them and charged me for 2 parcels and because they are too big to fit into any of their boxes, both were classes as oversized and I had to pay €14 for them.

The same thing happened yesterday when I shipped them 2 paintings as 1 shipment but again because they were 2 boxes strapped together, they once again separated them and charged me €14.

I really don't think this is fair and I actually don't think they have the right to interfere with my parcels.

I did email them about the mirrors but they didn't bother to respond with any explanation.

Any opinions on this?

Did you pack them yourself? Are you sure they were strapped together properly? I'd be surprised if they'd split parcels.

nava

cheif kaiser wrote: »

Has anyone else had an issue with Parcel Motel splitting their packages into 2 separate parcels and charging for 2? I ordered 2 mirrors recently which were shipped to parcel motel as 1 package under the one tracking number, however, when they got to parcel motel because the boxes were simply strapped together, parcel motel separated them and charged me for 2 parcels and because they are too big to fit into any of their boxes, both were classes as oversized and I had to pay €14 for them.

The same thing happened yesterday when I shipped them 2 paintings as 1 shipment but again because they were 2 boxes strapped together, they once again separated them and charged me €14.

I really don't think this is fair and I actually don't think they have the right to interfere with my parcels.

I did email them about the mirrors but they didn't bother to respond with any explanation.

Any opinions on this?

I would contact them about that, they should not split parcels they are interfering with your parcel.

Can you see that tape was cut to split the parcels? It would be very greedy on them if they did. Take pictures of parcels before opening if it shows they did that so you could email them to the customer service.

Could it be that even that they had 1 tracking number they were shipped as 2 parcels? Check if any of them have parcel 1 of 2 or parcel 2 of 2 or similar.

jimmynokia

If the packages where to big and they where split to fit seperate lockers what is the charge for an oversized delivery to your house,weight it up that way. look at both sides of the coin here. A, they may or may not have been a 2 piece consignment and B they may have done you a favour and C, Hopefully not the case and interfered with your package for gain.

sniper_samurai

Could be possible. I had customs interfere with packages like this once. I had two parcels from Hong Kong arrive in country on the same day, both individually below the limit to be charged VAT. They sent me their letter asking for the value for which I complied. When the packages arrived customs had duct taped the two parcels together and charged me VAT on the combined total.

This was clearly done by customs as both packages had address labels and franked postmarks.

styron

If they're in effect separate consignments tagged together by the seller for convenience I wouldn't have a problem - unless they were wrapped together.

There's a small chance they were split as a cost saving exercise - outsize parcels get exorbitant as thickness increases:

100 x 60 x 27cm = €7
100 x 60 x 28cm = €14
100 x 60 x 33cm = €21
100 x 60 x 38cm = €28

https://my.parcelmotel.com/Member/PriceCalculator

styron

sniper_samurai wrote: »

Could be possible. I had customs interfere with packages like this once. I had two parcels from Hong Kong arrive in country on the same day, both individually below the limit to be charged VAT. They sent me their letter asking for the value for which I complied. When the packages arrived customs had duct taped the two parcels together and charged me VAT on the combined total.

This was clearly done by customs as both packages had address labels and franked postmarks.

Epic ****tiness ... though I'm always VAT-paranoid enough to split purchases over different days if bargain fever permits.

cheif kaiser

The first 2 were 2 bathroom mirrors which of course are extremely narrow and did not weigh a lot. Combined they would barely add up to 1 oversized parcel. I could also see the markings on the boxes where they had been taped together.


The second 2 are 2 canvas paintings so again their weight would be very minimal and again combined together they would barely work out as 1 oversized parcel.
The were definitely shipped as 1 and the 1 tracking number all along the route indicates.. it's at the hub, it's with the carrier, etc.

Had either of these shipments even had some brown paper wrapped around them, they would had no choice but to class them as 1 but because you could see that they were 2 boxes, they were separated and charged as 2 oversized parcels.

jimmynokia wrote: »

If the packages where to big and they where split to fit seperate lockers what is the charge for an oversized delivery to your house,weight it up that way. look at both sides of the coin here. A, they may or may not have been a 2 piece consignment and B they may have done you a favour and C, Hopefully not the case and interfered with your package for gain.

They were both charged as €7 each for me to pick up in Finglas. if I want them delivered to my house, I have to pay an extra €10 each adding up to €34 in total for 2 canvas paintings!?!? I could have had them delivered directly to me for €22 so where is the favour?

nsa0bupkd3948x

cheif kaiser wrote: »

The were definitely shipped as 1 and the 1 tracking number all along the route indicates.. it's at the hub, it's with the carrier, etc.

Are you 100% sure they were sent as one parcel and not one shipment.

It wouldn't be unusual for one shipment to be scanned at the same time in each place but still be two separate parcels. If they were delivered together thats very poor form by Parcel Motel.

deezell

I'll bet Styron is right. When the volume of an oversize parcel is less than 0.165 cubic metres (165 Litres) it is charged at €7 , with a weight limit of 55kg . Each .03 cubic metre (30 Litre) increase in volume ups the price by €7. A large flat package of 110 x 150 x 10 cm costs 7€ , 2 of these cost €14. Tape them together and the increase in volume is five and a half extra jumps of .03 , rounded up to six. This parcel will cost an additional 6x7 = €42 extra, €49 in total. Splitting into 2 only costs €14. Someone at the depot was doing you a favour.

cheif kaiser

deezell wrote: »

I'll bet Styron is right. When the volume of an oversize parcel is less than 0.165 cubic metres (165 Litres) it is charged at €7 , with a weight limit of 55kg . Each .03 cubic metre (30 Litre) increase in volume ups the price by €7. A large flat package of 110 x 150 x 10 cm costs 7€ , 2 of these cost €14. Tape them together and the increase in volume is five and a half extra jumps of .03 , rounded up to six. This parcel will cost an additional 6x7 = €42 extra, €49 in total. Splitting into 2 only costs €14. Someone at the depot was doing you a favour.

I think you have your figures mixed up there. I am shipping 2 bathroom mirrors, not 2 doors! They were 50x70x10 if you stick 2 of them together they are 50x70x20 and both work at €7 because they have not gone over the dimensional weight. The same would apply to 2 pictures.

deezell

cheif kaiser wrote: »

I think you have your figures mixed up there. I am shipping 2 bathroom mirrors, not 2 doors! They were 50x70x10 if you stick 2 of them together they are 50x70x20 and both work at €7 because they have not gone over the dimensional weight. The same would apply to 2 pictures.

I can only speculate as to the motive for an operative to split flat packs. Your dimensons are well within the limits when the packs are taped together, it must happen frequently with larger flat packs that the staff split them. Perhaps the person who did does not fully understand when to split and when not. You have a valid case for sure. Did you get two text alerts and pin numbers to collect? Did you raise it with the people at the depot when collecting. The agent I spoke to at Xmas mentioned the huge number of new staff hired at the time, 150 or more. I'd imagine a lot of these would be prone to errors in work practice, especially in regard to something like splitting packets to save customers costs. It may not even be official policy. I can't imagine it's policy to do the opposite to boost charges. It's not ryanair! I'd phone them or visit the depot with the boxes and paperwork.

moleyv

Anyone know the opening hours of the PM depot off the North Road?