Here is a story I read and I think it is worth spreading.
If the moderators feel different please delete this post by all means.
The story was in a performance car magazine dated this month October 2010.


This relates to a one off ECU made for a Rover SD1 27 litre!......

We sent 1200 quid’s worth of ECU back to the factory for some mods and Royal Mail never delivered it. A week after we posted it, in a clearly labelled parcel with a return address, we rang them and they managed to trace it as far as the sorting office near the packages delivery address. But they couldn’t say what happened to it after that.
We now know that it was sent to a warehouse in Belfast, where it was auctioned off by a firm called Wellers.
They sold it to a Leeds based man who trades on eBay as longlivethehoff. He stuck the ECU on eBay and Omex, who made it, spotted it. They contacted him and he refused to return it, saying he’d bought it legitimately. We contacted Royal Mail, eBay and the police and none of them were interested.
Royal Mail even tried denying that they sell other peoples goods at first, presumably because the person in the press office found the idea as unbelievable as we do.
But when she checked up she discovered that it’s true.
I e-mailed longlivethehoff and asked him to confirm that he wouldn’t send our ECU back but he ignored me, twice. I suggest you all send him pointless questions about the many goods he has for sale on eBay as I write, as it’s reasonable to assume that lots of them actually belong to someone else. Hell- you may even find something on there that Royal Mail has lost for you.
He freely admits that he goes to Weller’s auctions regularly and buys a pallet of parcels that Royal Mail have, as they put it, ‘failed to deliver’.
It seems that Royal Mail are allowed to sell off our things if they ‘fail to deliver’ them within two months of posting. Which begs the question; what incentive do they have to deliver them?
It’s surely better for them not to, as then they get to flog them off- far more profitable than actually delivering them. So what can we do?
Well, as none of the parties involved nor the police are interested in helping us, the answer appears to be nothing.
Except perhaps tell as many people as possible about this scam and hope that mounting public pressure forces a change. Oh –and don’t buy anything from longlivethehoff.

after I read this I tried searching Ebay for that user, when the result came back it was a trading company.
I find this unacceptable ,note that only a week had passed since the poster had started to enquire about the whereabouts of the Ecu .
It seems that they can work fast when they want to.
Gary

This is terrible! The Royal mail should be stripped of their 'Royal' charter, how can they possibly say that they 'failed to deliver' when items are clearly addressed and with return address too. I think, in the past, I have seen this 'seller' on ebay but never bought from him. I have been a supporter of RM in the past but am beginning to think that they may deserve privatisation-only thing is we'll probably get a worse service....

Alan.

Pretty much how I feel about the royal mail, the amount of post they have lost recently for me is ridiculous, even when sent recorded delivery.

It seems crazy paying money for something that is rarely delivered and surely contravenes trading standards acts!

However as you have found, when you ring up to tell them they have lost your item, nobody cares!
Just yesterday i found they have lost an important contract in the post of my girlfriends, i went to the effort of getting proof of postage, now she is lucky she still has the job offer!

Hello Folks,
Something is definitely very wrong when clearly labelled parcels go missing,it can't be rocket science to get a parcel through a controlled environment such as the sorting depots must be.
A story like this should warrant further investigation.
davetherave google that users name and see where it takes you to ? have a look through that sellers items you might find some of your lost post.
This is most certainly absolutely unacceptable and the more people that know the better.
Gary

I searched on ebay for longlivethehoff and a match came up: retailandtradeoutlet. This seller is not offering anything for auction right now.

Something is very wrong when a mail delivery service is free to sell parcels entrusted to them on the pretext 'failure to deliver'. And then after only 60 days. This encourages fraud and scams. Goods that cannot be delivered must be returned to sender. And (not so) Royal Mail must prove they have done everything possible to find the addressed and the addressee. If they failed that there could not be a contract based on trust.

The only way around this disinterested, untrustworthy, lax carrier is taking out insurance when mailing something or use a courier service. Sad and deplorable.

This story was reported in - damm, I cant remember which mag now, stupid that sounds because I bought the Mag thats got the report!

Ive always been suspiscious of royal Mail... they've lost a few things for me in the past...

Paul