Royal Mail Redirection

[WesternLancer]

Royal Mail Redirection does try and match the name used on the redirection form with common alternative versions of you tick the relevant boxes on the application form. I think the example they give on the form is if you apply under the name Susan Smith they'll redirect Sue Smith if you tick the relevant box.

They can't always do this though, not least because the new residents may have a similar name, but also culturally I've knocked on doors doing political canvassing where you have a Muhammed Ahmed, Mohammed Ahmed, Mohamed Ahmed, or something along those lines; and RM can't just assume.

You can always contact RM to query things like this and get small amendments put in place though.

Indeed, this is the main reason I suspect that if a sticker was stuck over an old address without paying extra postage, a surcharge would be made for the recipient. It doesn't help that RM are unofficially prioritising packages over letters and being told to stick more strictly to the rules. Our local postie before we moved was super flexible. I'm betting I could name a few things she used to do which were not allowed but were excellent customer service. I know for a fact she used to do very well on Christmas tips!

All v good points here.

 

[londonbridge]

I gave up after a while and said I'd pop them in the postbox marked return-to-sender. Had to manually contact a few companies to ask them to remove our address/mark it old/obsolete, as they ignored the return-to-sender post.

I’ve done Christmas temping with Royal Mail on several occasions, when dealing with return to sender mail I had a good laugh at some of the messages written on the envelopes. As well as the standard ‘not known at this address’, you’d get “doesn’t live here”, “moved out”, “gone”, “gone away”, “person gone”, “this person doesn’t live at this address”, and “no such person”. When it came to companies ignoring previous attempts to tell them they’d got the wrong address you’d sometimes get additions like “this is the second time”, or “for the third time”, and “please update your records”, etc, but my favourite was always “The (surname) family moved out FIVE YEARS AGO, UPDATE YOUR FUXXXNG RECORDS!!!”

 

[Dr Hoo]

Only five years? I often return letters (to the same financial organisation) addressed to someone who lived at my address over 20 years ago.

 

[IanXC]

Only five years? I often return letters (to the same financial organisation) addressed to someone who lived at my address over 20 years ago.

For a financial services organisation thats probably a failure on Know Your Customer!

 

[AndrewE]

For a financial services organisation thats probably a failure on Know Your Customer!

but extremely good (lucrative) business, allowing them to justify sitting on - and playing the markets with - money that they should have given back to the rightful owners decades ago...
I wonder why they haven't tried harder?

 

[IanXC]

but extremely good (lucrative) business, allowing them to justify sitting on - and playing the markets with - money that they should have given back to the rightful owners decades ago...
I wonder why they haven't tried harder?

I'm not so sure about that. The fines for messing up KYC can be very considerable.

Plus the cost of administering a deposit account are not inconsiderable. Unless the deposit is £10k+ then it would actually be much more financially advantageous for the bank to declare it a dormant account and pass the funds over in that process.

The poster may wish to go into a branch of the financial organisation (I'm assuming they have them if its been ongoing for 20+ years) and tell a member of staff about this - that is a little more likely to result in the correct actions being taken.

 

[sprunt]

I'm not so sure about that. The fines for messing up KYC can be very considerable.

Plus the cost of administering a deposit account are not inconsiderable. Unless the deposit is £10k+ then it would actually be much more financially advantageous for the bank to declare it a dormant account and pass the funds over in that process.

It might not be a cash account, it might be an account at a wealth management company or similar, so they'll be charging their management fees and taking the money from the assets in the account - definitely financially advantageous for them, and in the absence of a correct address for the owner the only thing that they can do. Poor on their part to keep sending the comms to an address they've been told is wrong though - apart from anything else it seems like they shouldn't really be sending sensitive financial data to somewhere they know it won't be going to the person concerned.

After repeatedly getting sent mail from people who don't live here, having returned to sender more than once I don't bother any more, I just chuck them straight into the recycling. I'm not going to be an unpaid mailing secretary for a bank.

 

[WesternLancer]

This thread has reminded me to send back about 10 items for an adjacent property I know to be empty as tenants have moved away. Majority of the post seemed to be from the NHS given the logos on the envelopes. Not that I blame the NHS - I suspect the recipient had failed to advise whatever part of the NHS they were dealing with of their change of address.

I think many people simply don't know that returning post at no charge to the person wishing to send it back it is a thing you can do. And my hunch is that it's younger people who are less likely to know that, having grown up in an era when post is no longer the only medium for written communications. But younger people are more likely to live in rented property where the turnover of residents is much higher, which must magnify the problem of post being received for ex residents.

 

[MicroLithium]

I guess the RM system just uses name matching software which can't cope with even the smallest typo in the name

When I worked for Royal Mail the redirection system was entirely manual. Each walk had a pile of plastic envelopes with cards giving the details of the redirection to be made along with pre-printed address stickers. You had to sort all the mail for your walk, then check each slot that had a redirection for anything that needed to be sent on (this was at delivery office level). Somewhat prone to human error and also issues with partially matching names (e.g. mail for Susan Smith the daughter needs to be redirected, but Sue Smith the mother still lives here so deliver as normal). Whether redirection has now been added to automatic sorting I don't know.

 

[WesternLancer]

When I worked for Royal Mail the redirection system was entirely manual. Each walk had a pile of plastic envelopes with cards giving the details of the redirection to be made along with pre-printed address stickers. You had to sort all the mail for your walk, then check each slot that had a redirection for anything that needed to be sent on (this was at delivery office level). Somewhat prone to human error and also issues with partially matching names (e.g. mail for Susan Smith the daughter needs to be redirected, but Sue Smith the mother still lives here so deliver as normal). Whether redirection has now been added to automatic sorting I don't know.

Thanks - interesting to read that experience of 'making it work in practice'