Post Office staff complain about earning less from pre-paid postage - anyone else had this?

[martian_sunrise]

My local post office manager always whinges when I take in ebay items with pre-paid postage because he says he earns less than if postage was bought at the PO. He never refuses to take any parcels but it's irritating nonetheless. I just tell him that's it's easier for me and I get  the reassurance of tracking too. Has anyone else had this issue at their local POs?

This started before Simple Delivery/Postage was introduced, so it's not a recent thing. There's even less work to do now as they just need to scan the label barcode and give me the receipt i.e. they don't weigh the packages.

[davrman]

If you tell him Simple Delivery is now compulsory for private sellers on eBay, he may stop complaining. At least he should understand it's not your choice. 

[martian_sunrise]

Yes, I have told him that but I think he just likes to whinge about things - not a good way of encouraging customers to come back again. 

[style_wise]

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[custom-giftsuk]

Had a few of them myself. It's only going to get worse. Any time I go into a post office, it's full of people returning stuff with QR codes. 

[martian_sunrise]

Yes, I've noticed that too. He's never complained about a return, but seems to take it personally when someone tries to send something new without buying the postage at the PO. It takes all sorts, I guess - I wouldn't want to do their job.

I'll not be sending feedback to the PO as it's just a minor irritation and I laugh it off, so I don't want him to get into trouble - I just wanted to see how common the problem was.

[direct.gifts]

The amount they get is less than if someone brought the postage directly from them.

It probably impacts their business and they make less profit so you can understand why they get upset about it .

People use post offices a lot less now so it is much harder to have a profitable business.

Although it is much quicker to deal with pre paid labels than weigh and label each package. So you can understand why they get paid less for it.

[dottytheduck]

Had some issues with my local post office when I took some prepaid parcels to them, after a bit of a debate they only took 2 of the 4 parcels so I ended up taking the others 2 to my local Royal Mail sorting office. This was not ideal as it meant 2 trips instead of the 1, now I have found another shop which does RM labels and I take them all there without any problems.

[martian_sunrise]

There used to be an issue with taking Tracked parcels to a PO i.e. you were meant to either take them to a delivery office or use a parcel box or locker. But then they started allowing POs to take Tracked parcels if you paid extra (think it was about 10-15p).

But when Markeplace Seller labels were introduced with Simple Delivery it became ok to take these to a PO without any surcharge. I can see why postmasters could feel aggrieved if they're getting smaller payments for taking pre-paid post, but maybe the Post Office should have negotiated a better deal with Royal Mail. Given their scandalous treatment of postmasters in the past it's not really surprising that they still don't seem to be looking out for them.

[thepillenwerfer]

I'd tell him at if he doesn't want to deal with them I'll take them to a different Post Office, a Delivery Office or have them collected in future.  It may make him realise that at least he's getting SOMETHING out of you.  I'd certainly be completing the survey linked to by Style_Wise above.

Grumpy/incompetent staff seem sadly common in Post Offices.  They've got a monopoly on some things but they certainly don't encourage you to go there for stationary, sweets or whatever.