Frustrated Wagga residents have taken to social media to complain about lengthy delays with Australia Post.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
When Craig McCartney placed his eBay order on January 7, he thought it would take about a week to arrive at his door. But three weeks later, there was still no sign of the parcel.
“It hadn’t turned up after a week so I left it a few more days then contacted the seller, he gave me a refund and I ordered it again,” Mr McCartney said. “Then the first one turned up at my door.”
The parcel had a “postage paid” sticker on it with the date January 9, the first Monday after Mr McCartney placed his order. He said the delay was “ridiculous”.
“It’s not the first time this has happened,” he said.
“We’re trying to run a small, home-based business and parcels have gone missing only to turn up again later.”
Complaints about delivery delays have flooded onto websites like productreview.com.au, which had seen 12 one-star reviews for Australia Post since February 1. Many of the complaints centred on unusually long delivery delays, including one case where a letter took nine days to travel 35 kilometres.
The problems aren’t new, with complaints of “tourist parcels” – that do laps of the country before arriving at their destination – emerging in May, 2016, after Australia Post introduced its two-speed delivery service.
A massive $222 million loss after tax in 2015 and declines in the volume of letters posted led to managing director Ahmed Fahour declaring “the success we are having with parcels and the rest of our commercial business has had to absorb this.”
“As a result of significant investment and focus over the past five years in eCommerce, our revenue from parcels has grown 136 per cent,” Mr Fahour said. “We are a parcel company more than we are a letters company.”
However, reports of packages being sent from Adelaide to Melbourne to Sydney and back to Adelaide have called into question the success of that model.
“We sent a package to a customer a few months ago and even with tracking it disappeared – Australia Post couldn’t find it – and then three months later is turned up at their door,” Mr McCartney said.
“They want to take the dollars and not give the service, there’s no way we could run our business like that.”