Hi,

I'm currently awaiting the arrival of two separate items my bank has sent out for me.

The first is a letter dated Dec. 27th, the second a statement dated Jan 1st. When I reported that they had not arrived, the bank sent out a duplicate statement and commented that it should take about 10 days to be delivered.

The statement address is definitely correct, and although the letter was addressed to Sebu City, Philippines instead of Cebu City, the zipcode was still correct.

I was also surprised to hear that someone here who wanted to send urgent notifications in writing to the UK (early December?) was told Airmail would take 6 weeks. He ended up using DHL instead.

Does anyone else have any advice on these kinds of problem please?

Up till about 2003, when e-mails really kicked off. The usual time for mail was 7-35 days either way. With 11-17 being the norm. Sadly these days six weeks seems to be the norm. Bank sends statement 1st or thereabouts, expect to receive 14th - 20th of the following month.
For anything urgent DHL or LBC is your only hope.

Banks, Government, Insurance! Try telling them that a reply within seven days is totally impossible.

We get our UK mail forwarded by the Royal Mail and it seems to take an average of 3/4 weeks. We got mail yesterday sent by Royal Mail on 29th December. It was stamped in Manila on 10th Jan and by Cebu on 15th Jan.

I sent some documents back to UK via DHL for 2600pesos, left SM City Cebu on Thursday evening, delivered in Uk on monday morning (UK time). The Foreign Office returned documents to me, left Milton Keynes Tuesday and I got them Friday morning. cost 25 pounds.

Thanks, both.

Was beginning to wonder if I was supposed to collect it myself or pay for delivery or similar.

First post arrived Tuesday from down under over 6 weeks old, had been franked at Cebu Central a week earlier

We do go to the Post Office on occasion, to see if there is mail waiting to be delivered. If so you may save a few days.

Just to show how erratic it can be. Got 2 pieces of UK mail yesterday.Addressed direct.
Franked in Cebu City post office on 10th Jan and in consolacion post office 21st! 11 days to travel approx 6 KM.

This morning got our regular monthly Royal Mail re-direct, franked in Cebu on Monday, 20th, no frank in Consolacion but here today. so, this time 3 days to travel 6KM!

I have lived in the provinces for many years, it can take days for post to travel 25km. Unfortunately if it has a bank symbol on the envelope or what feels like a credit card inside it has a habit of evaporating in transit. My UK bank is happy to use my brother's UK address for anything posted, he scans it and e-mails it, if it is important puts in a different envelope and forwards.

Same here Stokkevn.
We use a friends UK address for Bank and Credit card.
When new cards arrive she sends them via DHL for us.
That way we know we're going to get them!
A few pounds for DHL is better than the risk of them "disappearing"!