scot47

Liveaboard
Time to start thinking differently. Adjust to the local way oif doing things.

Diddion

liveaboard

What would be the local way then?

Pica

Don't believe anything will happen when they say it will

BillBullock

You obviously don't understand the problem Peter. Not all deliveries are under our control. For example, if you purchase something online in Europe, the seller is in control and if he chooses to use GLS, the company with the worst record for deliveries, you can do little about it other than cancel your order. I have been waiting for a mini computer to be delivered and have been tracking it all the way until it got to Madrid where it has been stuck in the GLS depot since 28 November. Finally, today, GLS in Lisbon have admitted that my parcel is lost. My supplier will have to send me a replacement when he is satisfied that the parcel is indeed lost, probably stolen by a GLS employee. I have asked the supplier not to use GLS again but, of course, it is up to him.

peterfc

Oh you are so wrong i won't deal with anybody who won't use UPS or allow me to send in UPS. I have a friend and my family who are happy to take in parcels and then put everything into one box and ship it over to me. As i said I am in control.

Peter

GeniB

That is precisely the problem for most of us Bill.. Peter feels happy because he is in control .. Our problem is when we are not in control..ie when someone else is sending a parcel to us ,and they use GLS.. ie One of my previous posts was about a present sent to my granddaughter from an aunt in the UK. She sent it via the Royal Mail to my YD in her apartment in Luz ,and asked that it be signed for ( fatal as it does mean GLS will get it on this side ) We had no idea this parcel was coming ( last Christmas ) so didn't know it was AWOL until aunt asked about it in January. Enquiries at Royal Mail said it had been passed to GLS. Enquiries at GLS said it had been delivered and signed for ... NO it had not.. It was down to us to 'track it ' Starting in our local SPA grocer in Luz...No they didn't have it.. A long drive to the GLS depot near Faro. They had moved. Luckily a SEUR driver was there and gave us directions to their frankly bizarre new 'hide out' in the hills. Enquiry there .. ( only in Portuguese ) Yes the parcel had been delivered and signed for.. NO it hadn't..Check on computer .. Yes it had been signed for by Senhor Jose Feriera at the SPA grocery in Lagos !!! We drove there . NO the parcel wasn't there.. It had gone to Luz. We drove back to Luz and gave them the number given to us by the postman in Lagos... and LO... The parcel miraculously appeared. This whole damn fiasco cost us 6 hours of our time,money for petrol ,and a lunch in Faro. and no small amount of frustration and temper.

So yes some of us are a tad tetchy on this subject... We have reason
P.S The parcel was correctly addressed to the apartment in luz ,with GPS and telephone number in the address.

Pica

GeniB

I don't know where you are living Pica ( Algarve? ) If you are, do what we do now... IF WE ARE IN CONTROL .... That is too buy items in the UK using most department stores etc. Have items delivered to Direct Transport in Porches... They collect and deliver once a week..Their charges are very low ,but they don't contact you when your parcel comes in .You have to work out from your order date and details when it is likely ( or call them first ) ...
Its annoying to have to pay any extra on top of what you have already paid for an item... but until the Portuguese government deals with this mess..its the safest way.

On the question of slippers... I do try to buy as much as I can locally ... Don't your think the wonderful locally made sheepskin slippers with the ridged rubber soles ,( that are cheap as chips ) would do ? I love mine....

peterfc

It's OK for those in the Algarve to have a transport company deliver for them but for the rest of us deliveries are crap.
For up to 30kilo Parcel2go are now the best just follow the instructions and i pay app £25. On the label insert your phone number on the second line of the address. There is space on the label so add your phone number again. Whatever Country you are in best of look.

macliam

Well, having had my last ebay delivery "delivered" (but not to me!!), I arranged for this one to be delivered to a friend with a shop in the town.

On Friday, the delivery information daid "Your item will be delivered today".

Guess what........

liveaboard

2 deliveries I couldn't receive Wednesday because I wasn't home; both told me they would come back on Thursday.
The fridge came Friday, the other parcel is in the wind.

macliam

Friday is the new Thursday.......

The BEST delivery I had was from Worten when they delivered our new washing machine (a Samsung eco-bubble) from the Algarve. We paid and arranged delivery late on a Tuesday, they said they were "Not sure that next day delivery would be possible", but that it would definitely be with us by Thursday PM. "Yeah, yeah", I thought...... and gave them our mobile number, address, GPS coords, etc. on a Google map they brought up in store.

Thursday AM, a white van came honking along the dirt track which passes our house. The delivery people, a couple, apologised for not phoning but said that they were heading up the IC1 towards Grandola and out GPS coords showed us so close that they thought it better to drop our delivery first! They unpacked and installed the machine and loaded our old one - after checking whether they could get it working again for us! All done and dusted in about 35 minutes - and SWMBO was using it within the hour.

So it CAN be done.........

PS- the kicker to the story is that we saw the same machine on sale in Peter Jones whilst back in the UK - and it was a lot more expensive there!!

Pica

I live in very rural Abruzzo- couriers pretend our address is wrong to save themselves the effort of driving up here. Usually they'll phone and we advise them to leave parcels at the local bar; which they're happy to do but not even a phone call this time. getting a refund will be easy but I wanted the items not a refund.

macliam

I know what you mean - we ordered a footstool cover to match our sofa and armchair, because Ikea had "helpfully" stopped stocking that colour/fabric. The cover was supposedly coming from Germany (so no customs issues) and was using ebay's own suggested service - which added 25% to the cost of the item. It actually shipped from Poland to Germany, then on to Madrid, where it was handed over to a Spanish carrier who claimed to cover Portugal. Then it shipped from Madrid to Evora and disappeared into a black hole...... popping up a helpful note to say it had been "delivered" when we had seen neither hide nor hair of it. The Spanish carrier had only a Spanish helpline in Madrid (i.e. an international call in a different language), and its website gave no indication of the Portuguese agent and no email contact except via it's own inline form - which they ignored completely. When I proved to ebay that "someone" had taken the address I supplied to them, stripped off the mobile number and comments (about a local drop-off point), used only the first four digits of the post-code and changed the locality.... ebay refunded in full. BUT, I still had the problem of finding a matching footstool cover!!

Luckily, whilst back in the UK another cover was advertised - with free delivery to a UK address. So I had it delivered to me in England and brought it to Portugal in my hand-baggage! Nice point was, it was about £8 cheaper than the first cover, plus no €15 carriage fee.....ker-ching!!

I also paid £28 for baggage on my flight to Faro (I normally use hand-baggage only) and packed a soft bag with a good cutlery set, a few tools I needed (a good dreadnaught file and some japanese saw blades) and good quality feather cushion inserts, vacuum-packed. In the end I only used about 16kg of my 22kg allowance - but I couldn't physically fit more in the case! It was still cheaper than buying in Portugal (if available) or having items sent to me (especially via Spain!!)