Christmas delivery problems analysed

Thursday, December 8, 2016 - 15:13 by David Aiken

With tens of millions of people across the UK anticipating the arrival of Christmas gifts they have ordered online this year, it is understandable that at least some customers will suffer delivery setbacks.

However, a new report from Citizens Advice has suggested that the scale of this issue may be greater than many might imagine, with the average shopper expected to each take at least 2.5 hours to deal with a raft of delivery-related issues, according to the Guardian.

In the run-up to Christmas last year, a total of 4.8 million deliveries did not go as smoothly as expected, with many people failing to receive any kind of compensation for the trouble they had experienced.

Analysts estimate that, in total, consumers missed out on £148 million in compensation which they were technically due but did not receive, whether because the items they ordered were lost, damaged or compromised in some other way.

Experts advise consumers to take up any delivery issues they have with the retailer from which they ordered the goods, rather than trying to jump through hoops by dealing directly with the delivery company that was tasked with getting it to their door in one piece.

Over the course of November and December of 2016, it is anticipated that more than 390 million packages will be delivered nationally, with the rise in safe shopping online helping to fuel this increase. Because of this, the percentage of deliveries which experience problems of some kind is also predicted to increase.

Report spokesperson, Gillian Guy, said that while e-commerce sites were set up to simplify the shopping process, in many cases they could actually make it more complicated when items do not arrive on time, fail to fit the original description or are imperfect in some other way.