Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 08:43:44 on Sun, 2 Jun 2019,
Recliner remarked:
Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 22:37:39 on Sat, 1 Jun 2019,
Recliner remarked:
Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 10:25:49 on Sat, 1 Jun 2019,
Recliner remarked:

And now there's another contender, prepared to make even bigger losses in
the quest for market sha

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/r...s-to-drive-ube
r-off-the-road-as-cab-price-war-begins-ql50hf2d3?shareToken=ae520e4dc8d6
1cbc54da17360bf58ba6

This story mentions that Uber now takes a 35% commission from new drivers.

£7.50/hr [Uber driver quoted] and providing your own car, doesn't seem
like it's worth it to me.

That's why only immigrants will do it. It's probably a step up from a car
wash.

But I don't think Amazon delivery drivers have a much better deal.

No, I suppose not.

At least Amazon drivers now turn up in smart newish (unmarked) vans,

That may be a regional thing. My Amazon deliveries are still mainly
arriving in a beaten up and rattley ten year old car-based diesel van.
But is unmarked (by signage, anyway)

Mine come from Hemel Hempstead.

Didn't we decide here was a local hub too, it's quite a way for every
van driver on every delivery run to start from.

All my deliveries are assembled and despatched from Hemel. If I'm scheduled
for early on the round, I can watch him speeding down the M1 and follow his
route through the suburbs, as he drops off the earlier parcels.

There are obviously other Amazon Logistics centres around the country.



not beaten-up private cars, like some other couriers. They also don't
seem to have impossible delivery rounds, as they nearly always turn up
on the right day, and don't falsely pretend they've attempted a
delivery when they haven't (unlike Parcelforce).

I expect the Amazon drivers are tracked by their handheld devices which
may forbid the issuing of a "missed delivery" unless they are physically
on the doorstep.

Yes, very likely. They certainly track them in real time, and so can you,
as they show them on a map when they're under ten deliveries away, and tell
you how many more they have to do before getting to you.

That varies a lot by courier.

Not with Amazon, which is what I'm describing.


The "silently post a card through the letterbox" syndrome is different,
and is more likely to be caused by the driver discovering the parcel o
his delivery list isn't in his van after all, but he has to register an
attempted delivery to make his quota. Amazon is likely better at
ensuring the vans are properly loaded at the depot.

I've had more than one Parcelforce 'delivery' where no delivery was
attempted, and no postcard through the door. But on their website, they
claimed that a delivery had been attempted, and the parcel had then been
taken to the local Post Office. My guess is that the driver was running
late, and just dropped all the remaining parcels off there.

Was that the local sub-post-office counter, or the sorting office?

Lately, with Parcelforce, it's been the local sub-post office. Royal Mail
deliveries (and they don't cheat) go back to the sorting office.


Usually their missed delivery card gives an option of collection from
one or the other, or a re-delivery. Something the lack of a card is
circumventing.

Royal Mail give the option, but not Parcelforce.


If it had been left behind at the depot by mistake (or put in the wrong
van) then later sending it to a sub-post-office could be their attempt
to cover their tracks.

Could be, but I think it's the driver(s) cheating.