I had a large batch of A4 photographic paper disappear into their system between here & Brighton. I had to refund the buyer. After many many emails etc etc over a couple of months I just gave up. Never got the paper (5Kg) back or the supposed compensation that was due.

@Samsaranda. Amazon use them in my area also. Wife had (supposedly) 2 small parcels delivered through the door last week. Only 1 was on the mat. After a call to Amazon the other one arrived 5 days later. ??

regards

If you can leave me your email address in my pm of this forum , then I can send you some essential Hermes contacts.

Essentially , until you know the 'way-in' Hermes is a world of pain.

They have an unresolved security problem in their distribution centres , stuff disappears..

Commiserations, very annoying. I think a problem that you may face in pursuing Hermes is that you do not have a legal contract with them The seller of the watch does. If the seller is bona-fide can he take this up with Hermes? I thought that all goods dispatched via Hermes had an automatic minimum insured value of around £20.

If you paid by, say, Paypal then their Buyer Protection might help.

Your contract with the merchant. His with the courier. If your merchant declines to fulfil his end of the bargain, I would speak to Trading Standards., if the credit card/PayPal route is closed to you.

IMHO you should not be negotiating with the courier.

The cynic in me makes me wonder if this is not the merchants first rodeo, and perhaps a grain of truth in the initial response from the courier.

This was covered in the latest 'Consumeractive' section of Computer Active wasn't it. I thought that they were chasing this up for you to see if they can persuade or prod Hermes into action and get some resolution to the problem. That said to date I haven't had a problem with Hermes so consider myself somewhat fortunate but as per the norm for any company problems are highlighted but good/adequate service slips by unnoticed.

That said it is always worth knowing when these incidents happen as it can give an indication of the relative merits of any service, but as always it is the companies offering the cheapest service that seem to be more susceptible to making a pigs ear of things. Yet we continue to use these services and hope for the best, it would be interesting to know what percentage of their trade has had a problem and compare that to other couriers performance figures including successful resolutions.

I have no vested interests in Hermes and have to date not had a problem, keeping fingers firmly crossed as I am expecting some deliveries soon.

Hope you get it sorted to your satisfaction soon and as you say 'It's your £20'.

Martin

Last month, I purchased an item off eBay. Hermes claimed the had posted it through our letter box at a certain time.

We were in, but nothing came through our letter box in the from door. We are ten feet/ three metres from the main road. House name on the gate and on the house.

We have CCTV.

After many emails to the Seller, we got a refund. The item was £6.

I'm sure the seller thought we were on the fiddle.

My thoughts were: Cheap Courier, expect failures, but don't expect us to fund them.

I sent a chop-mitre saw to a buyer through Hermes and he came back to me with a photograph of the saw all smashed, It was packed OK by me so I can only say that it was VERY BADLY HANDLED by the company, I tried contacting them through their website but they said the tracking number and the postcode don't match anything on their site so I shall be ringing them to tell them I have a photo and to contact the buyer so that we can get it sorted Hopefully.

Alistair

I have sent you a PM

Martin

My missus is currently trying to get a parcel which Hermes have had for a couple of weeks. She has been exchanging emails with the seller who is Marks & Spencer but their hands are tied and they apparently have to use whichever carrier is immediately available to the distribution centre.

It needs someone with a media connection to do an expose of Hermes since they appear to more or less use slave labour and at least half their business seems to end in frustration for both buyers and sellers…..there's more to the story than most people know.

Had a parcel delivered by Hermes last week, it was fish food for my Koi purchased from Amazon Prime, the food is contained in a stout plastic drum and the weight is 10 kilos. When it arrived it was the drum just wrapped in grey plastic, on opening the plastic wrapping I found that the drum had been crushed and the lid had burst open, must have take a fair force to achieve that amount of damage, and the fish food pellets were spilling out of the drum and through tears in the plastic wrapping. I emailed Amazon and asked them to tell their carriers to take more care of items that customers have paid good money for, their response was immediate and apologetic and they refunded the total cost of the fish food which amounted to £68.85, so full marks to Amazon on that score but I wish they wouldn’t use cowboy carrier firms. Dave W