AP pausing parcel collections in Melbourne again Oct 1 - Oct 6

[love_of_cars]

For eParcel and Parcel Post, all pickups, collections and business lodgements in Greater Melbourne Metro will be paused for five days, from 12.01am Friday 1 October to 12.01am Wednesday 6 October.

Read more:

https://view.email.auspost.com.au/?qs=3cbeef61f681b22de7c96b4d8a0d3a319382485877a3bf5a47d3c4055a2f17...

[designers*n*more]

And just to rub salt into the wound…….Aust Post have just raised their postage prices! Second time now they have stopped collections since raising their postage costs.

[chameleon54]

---

@lynsh84 wrote:

It is not as simple as hiring more people Chameleon.

Back when Covid reared it's ugly head early last year the depot where my husband was working from (StarTrack in inner south western Sydney) had a sorting machine that could sort 10 times the amount of parcels that could be taken by the couriers on any one day.

It was quite a juggling act to arrange the sorting tables to take into account the safe distancing rules......there is simply no room to put any more bodies to work.

After the early morning StarTrack couriers left, the space was taken over by trucks and vans delivering for Officeworks.

Most of the AP facilities that we know of are in the same position......there is just no room to increase the staff, despite the huge increase in the volume of parcels.

Nothing has changed in 18 months.....there is still no room to increase the number of bodies in the facilities and no other suitable buildings to open more distribution centres withing a suitable distance.

---

Nothing has changed in 18 months and nothing is going to change in the next 18 months. Covid has caused structural changes in a lot areas including working from home and rapidly increasing the move to online shopping. ( something that was already happening ). 

The rest of the business community is told it has to pivot and adapt, while the protected Australia Post buries its head in the sand, does nothing and hopes it all goes away.

My sheep grazing business has been totally trashed by COVID. Wool that made up nearly half of  my revenue and output volume has been decimated by people staying home from evening entertainment and working from home. The last lot of wool I sold barely covered the cost of transport to the wool store, testing fees, handling fees and sales commissions. Once I paid the shearers I actually lost money. 

Throw in the worst drought on record at my remote farm ( no-one has even realises there are still pockets of drought in Australia ) and the loss of one of my main leased grazing properties and I,m getting totally smashed at the moment. Government hand outs and help ( same as city coffee shops or NSW drought affected farmers a few years ago ) ? ...................None offered, none expected. 

As always I,m just getting on with it, pivoting, adjusting, adapting and making it work.

Australia post simply needs to hire a few vacant warehouses ( plenty of them around at the moment ) fill them with sorting tables and put bodies on tables, manually sorting mail. ( same system as they used a few years ago ) Yes its might be less cost effective than centralised, automated sorting machines, but it would keep things moving while they make more permanent structural changes to adapt to our new reality .

Covid is highlighting a few home truths that needed to be aired. With our regimented society and closeted education and public service systems, Australians have lost the ability to think innovatively, lost the ability to be leaders in research and development and are very poor at adopting to changing circumstances. That's why our manufacturing base and research industries have moved to other more engaged nations. 

 Heaven help us if we ever had to go to war. With the regimented, unimaginative, stifled mentality of many, we would have no hope of meeting the rapidly changing demands conflict brings. We would be over run in days.

[danieh_6]

I second this. Last year they in Melbourne they opened temporary sorting facilities like in old warehouse, Closed school gyms, and other places.

I totally agree with the fact that you should think innovatively, example: how hard is to find some seccies out of work, some cameras (for theft protection) and bunch of people to hand sort stuff in an unused hall. You can social distance people too. Once they are sorted in the correct states you can scan them or put them in the automatic facilities. Having no room is not an excuse,

Also what brain surgeon at Australia Post keeps thinking its a great idea to pause collections for a Monday???.
Pause it from Monday night to friday morning, Most ecommerce sales are on the weekend.

[everard6920]

The entire AP network is a disaster right now.

Ordered three items: 2 packets of tracked envelopes from the AP store - one pack on the 14th and one on the 15th (because I accidentally ordered too few on the 14th). Also ordered one personal use item from Japan on the 21st.

The envelopes ordered on the 15th arrived on the 21st.

The envelopes ordered on the 14th were crickets, so I asked them about them a few days ago and they told me they were sitting in a cage in Melbourne and will arrive "by October 22nd"

Meanwhile, the item from Japan left Tokyo on the 21st and arrived yesterday.

Make it make sense; it's like a lottery.

No complaints because I understand the difficulties but as someone else said, Christmas mailing is going to be nothing but pain

[sugar249]

---

@everard6920 wrote:

The entire AP network is a disaster right now.

Today must be the day for drama.  I would hardly call it a disaster.

Just checked of about 40 sales on Ebay between the 20th and the 29th.   90% delivered,  the rest in remoter localities.

Yes I have one item coming to me that has been stuck in Dandenong for a little while.

Not sure about disaster, a disater would be when nothing is moving.   But I guess disaster makes it sound better

[everard6920]

---

@sugar249 wrote:

---

@everard6920 wrote:

The entire AP network is a disaster right now.

Today must be the day for drama.  I would hardly call it a disaster.

Just checked of about 40 sales on Ebay between the 20th and the 29th.   90% delivered,  the rest in remoter localities.

Yes I have one item coming to me that has been stuck in Dandenong for a little while.

Not sure about disaster, a disater would be when nothing is moving.   But I guess disaster makes it sound better

---

You really typed all that because a stranger on the internet typed one word huh

Please touch some grass or find something better to do with your time.

[digital*ghost]

---

@chameleon54 wrote:

---

@lynsh84 wrote:

Nothing has changed in 18 months.....there is still no room to increase the number of bodies in the facilities and no other suitable buildings to open more distribution centres withing a suitable distance.

---

Australia post simply needs to hire a few vacant warehouses ( plenty of them around at the moment )

---

It sounds to me like they can't simply pick any old warehouse.  They have opened some new facilities already, but they clearly  can't be just anywhere, and sorted mail is useless if they don't also have the means to transport it afterwards, and therein lies the rub... qualified truck drivers are in much shorter supply than warehouses and willing / able bodies to sort packages.

As lynsh pointed out - the sorting machine was capable of doing ten times the amount of packages the carriers could handle, so it doesn't sound to me like sorting is the problem at all. 

If transport is the problem, then it becomes a bigger problem if there are more places for packages to be transported to / from. 

[lynsh84]

---

@digital*ghost wrote:

---

@chameleon54 wrote:

---

@lynsh84 wrote:

Nothing has changed in 18 months.....there is still no room to increase the number of bodies in the facilities and no other suitable buildings to open more distribution centres withing a suitable distance.

---

Australia post simply needs to hire a few vacant warehouses ( plenty of them around at the moment )

And you know this for a fact do you?

Chameleon I would not dream of telling you anything about farming as it is not my area of expertise so do me the courtesy of not making off the cuff remarks about the courier industry/AP/mail delivery.....industries where I have had 25+ years of experience, my OH had some 30 years experience and my daughter is up to 30 years and counting.

---

It sounds to me like they can't simply pick any old warehouse.  They have opened some new facilities already, but they clearly  can't be just anywhere, and sorted mail is useless if they don't also have the means to transport it afterwards, and therein lies the rub... qualified truck drivers are in much shorter supply than warehouses and willing / able bodies to sort packages.

Spot on Digi.....there is a little thing called OH & S that dictates what buildings are suitable taking into account the number of sorters needed, and the comings and goings of the vans and drivers who also have to sort their own runs.

As lynsh pointed out - the sorting machine was capable of doing ten times the amount of packages the carriers could handle, so it doesn't sound to me like sorting is the problem at all. 

If transport is the problem, then it becomes a bigger problem if there are more places for packages to be transported to / from. 

Another problem that is appearing is the fact that subcontractors want security in their work.....as seen by the recent strikes.  The companies cannot just keep on hiring new staff at the expense of their current subcontractors.   This is not a COVID induced problem....it has been around for a very long time.

---

[digital*ghost]

This would be an ideal time for someone to run some numbers and see if offering a kind of pick-up service for sellers who can't / won't do it themselves would be viable and take some of the pressure off. Imagine being able to take a package to a nearby post office or other independent outlet, and then a buyer can just come in and pick it up from the same location (unless I get myself a location other than my house to operate from, this is the only way buyers of mine would ever be able to avoid a postage cost, and I'd absolutely offer this option as a seller if it was available, and pay reasonable rates - preferably on a volume basis, eg covers X pick-ups a year with storage for a specific volume worked into the rates as well). 

This could really only be viable in major metro areas, I suspect, but that's where a high number of mail items are being sent to / from anyway - not sure if it would take enough mail out of the system to make a huge difference, though . (I know areas in lockdown this might not even be possible, but I'm thinking long-term alternatives to straining the postal system). 

[lynsh84]

---

@digital*ghost wrote:

This would be an ideal time for someone to run some numbers and see if offering a kind of pick-up service for sellers who can't / won't do it themselves would be viable and take some of the pressure off. Imagine being able to take a package to a nearby post office or other independent outlet, and then a buyer can just come in and pick it up from the same location (unless I get myself a location other than my house to operate from, this is the only way buyers of mine would ever be able to avoid a postage cost, and I'd absolutely offer this option as a seller if it was available, and pay reasonable rates - preferably on a volume basis, eg covers X pick-ups a year with storage for a specific volume worked into the rates as well). 

I get where you are coming from Digi but it is a scheme that has been tried and was a failure.  Some years ago Hunter couriers and I think E-Go started a system of dropping off parcels so customers could pick them up(also they were drop off points).....they used newsagents, chemists, drycleaners etc. but it was not long before the wheels fell off.   I had a parcel left 5 suburbs away and no way of getting it.

I believe ebay was some way involved too.....I seem to remember pickup and dropoff points being mentioned.

There is also the little problem of insurance.  Even a single driver offering a personal service of the type you have in mind would be hit with hundreds of $$$$ in insurance....certainly enough to make it not worth the effort.

To be honest, if the established courier companies got wind of it they would have a litter of kittens and shut the "renegade" driver down quick smart.

Many years ago my OH was asked to provide a service by one of the discount stores whereby he would be available to transport purchases which would not fit in the customer's car.....you know the sort of thing.....a queen sized mattress that would not fit in a mini.  lol

The courier company was OK with it as they were not interested in little jobs that were erratic and short distance and mainly on weekends when they would have to pay penalty rates.  They checked with the Union? and the wrath of all the Gods descended....needless to say that idea went west.

I am pretty sure nothing has changed recently.

This could really only be viable in major metro areas, I suspect, but that's where a high number of mail items are being sent to / from anyway - not sure if it would take enough mail out of the system to make a huge difference, though . (I know areas in lockdown this might not even be possible, but I'm thinking long-term alternatives to straining the postal system). 

---