There is way too much wrong with Evri for this one excuse to hold much water.

I avoid them like the plague.

Evri and DPD report an increase in orders as final Royal Mail
The First Class posting date is now Friday, December 16

Big-name retailers are bringing forward final Christmas ordering dates and private couriers say they're doing all they can to deliver gifts as the earlier deadline for sending post with Royal Mail nears.

Waterstones and The Entertainer are among those to have shifted festive shopping deadlines for purchases customers want before Christmas while M&S is warning that some orders 'may take a little longer to arrive'.

Royal Mail has been forced to bring forward Christmas posting dates after thousands of workers announced they would be striking on a number of dates in December including Christmas Eve.

With no agreement between bosses and the CWU union on the horizon, the postal service says the deadline for sending Christmas parcels and packages by First Class, which used to guarantee next-day delivery, is Friday, December 16 - an entire week before Christmas.

With reports that backlogs are building at Royal Mail depots and other couriers filling the void are now experiencing an increase in deliveries as Christmas gets closer, high street retailers offering delivery services are also altering final shopping dates in order to make sure people's gifts arrive.

Waterstones has brought forward the deadlines for online shoppers with the bookshop now cutting-off festive orders two days earlier than it had initially planned.

Those wishing to order presents must do so by December 19 for First Class deliveries with a message adding: "Royal Mail has confirmed strike action throughout December. We apologise for the disruption this is likely to cause as we expect some delay to our quoted delivery times."

In a message on its website, Marks & Spencer says most orders are being delivered within the usual time frames but has warned some online orders “may take a little longer to arrive". It has pushed back the time frame for click-and-collect orders, which shoppers can get from their nearest store without a minimum spend, as it also concentrates on dispatching parcels.

While in an interview with The Guardian executive chairman of The Entertainer Gary Grant confirmed the company had been forced to extend its delivery promise from three to five days to five to seven to allow for possible delays.

Last week electrical retailer Curry's said it would stop using Royal Mail for some smaller parcels in order to guarantee Christmas deliveries while private delivery firms say they are now experiencing a significant influx of orders as companies seek alternatives.

Both DPD and Evri have put out statements in recent days apologising for extended delivery times as they deal with a huge volume of parcels.
A statement from Evri, formerly Hermes, posted on its website reads: "We’re sorry that some of you are experiencing short, localised delays in receiving your parcels. Like other parcel delivery companies, we are seeing some service delays caused by high Christmas volumes, additional parcels in our network due to Royal Mail strikes, staff shortages, and severe weather conditions.

"Please bear with us. We’re currently delivering more than three million parcels a day and our teams across the country are working hard to make sure parcels are delivered in time for Christmas."

SOURCE



Now, about Evri...

People in Newark and surrounding areas such as Swinderby
and Collingham report issues with EVRI deliveries

People in and around Newark say they have been waiting weeks for parcels from courier EVRI.

From Newark town centre to Swinderby, Collingham and many other areas, households are receiving messages saying their address is inaccessible or are waiting over 10 days for their next-day deliveries.

Neither customers nor retailers say they are able to contact EVRI over their issues.

...“Retailers are telling me that they too have no way of contacting them and can only rely on an email enquiry they send, which is invariably ignored or at best, updated with the same lies the customer is being told.”

MORE


Just to be clear, I didn't exactly have to "trawl" the internet searching for complaints about Evri. Just type "evri news" into Google and these just are a few of the top results.
About 5,440,000 results (0.44 seconds)

The following are links to stories, none of which is over two days old. There are, as you can tell by the search results, literally millions more.  The last one is about behaviour we all probably recognise.

Businesses are going to keep on using Evri simply because they are cheap, but I wonder if this is the death knell sounding for people at home, who have a choice. Surely with the amount of bad press they receive their current business model in unsustainable? I hope.

Man arrested after Evri parcels reported stolen from Aylesford depot and packages found dumped in Beacon Road, Chatham

Norwich: Evri parcels dumped on street before Christmas

Evri apologise after Plymouth depot employees filmed throwing packages around

Mountain of parcels 'stolen from Evri depot and fly-tipped in woodland'

Mum furious as Evri parcel delays leave her stressing over Christmas presents 'ordered weeks ago'

Evri courier is caught on camera hurling parcel 20ft from road to customer's front door TWICE In less than two hours

How will Evri recover from this endless bad press? I think they deserve to fail. But it seems a lot of punters are determined to stick with the cheapest option no matter how badly Evri does. It's weird but round here Hermes used to be super reliable!

It's Amazon's turn.  I sent a Christmas gift to my local Pharmacy, via Amazon.

Amazon aduly ttempted delivery yesterday, Saturday, and unfortunately I'd forgotten that the Pharmacy closes at 13:00 on a Saturday.

Amazon contacted me to say there had been an attempted delivery, and they would redeliver on another date.  There was also a set of options with the message, allowing me to input the hours the premises would be occupied and able receive deliveries.  09.00 to 17.00 Mon to Fri, Saturday 09.00 - 13.00, Sunday, closed.  I filled it all in and sent it back.

Of course, it's out for delivery again today, Sunday. 

Amazon delivery today left a box in the rain. The bottom started collapsing as soon as I went to pick it up.

Another "delivered" parcel from Evri.  Fortunately one of my neighbours spotted it before it got stolen.  That's two in a row where they've just dumped and run away now.



It's my Christmas pressie from the kids.  My daughter-in-law thought she was being thoughtful and efficient, sending it via courier, because of the postal strikes.  She wanted to make sure I got it in time.  She sent mine and  Mum's at the same time.  The status on Mum's hasn't changed since they picked it up, on Sunday, at precisely the same time as they picked mine up.

Their tracking info is also as dependable as ever.    This is mine, since it was delivered.

Evri are excellent in our area.

Seeing the way a lot of parcels are treated at Evri I'm definitely not using them again I think. It's a shame because they used to be good round here, especially before they changed to Evri.

I never sent any high value items with them like hifi, that just never seemed a sensible idea!

I think the issue is that they (and others) were not prepared for the extra business they got from customers who moved away from Royal Mail during the strikes. Evri obviously doesn't have the infrastructure for this. But worse than that, the way parcels have been treated by staff at sorting centres and on delivery shows that too many of them just don't give a shit. I don't think either issue will be changed any time soon!