I might think Royal Mail prices weren't bad, if they lived up to their delivery schedules. Last year my Mum's birthday card with a first class stamp took 10 days to travel 20 miles.
The fact that her birthday is in December doesn't mean Royal Mail can treat every card in that month as a Christmas card and not bother about delivery times as long as they arrive by the 24th.

Sorry, meant to add that I've had bad experience with DPD, but excellent from Interlink Express (my local chap is called Guy and he's lovely). However someone I know in London has had nothing but bad experiences with Interlink Express, so it must come down to areas as well as companies.

GoodTwin - as someone with a WitchDay 8 days before the FOTCR (ha - got that in in March!), I have never, ever, had all my cards on/by the correct day, irrespective of when they are posted, so I can only sympathise.

And I think delivery companies efficiency is mainly about the drivers, but also their depot managers - if they treat the (often self-employed) drivers badly, then what hope is there of the drivers being in a happy mood, and so doing a good job (and driving carefully...).

Sorry, I think they are all as bad as each other. Most of the time when things happen as they should. When they don't it all goes into melt down.

Worth a mention though for sendmybag.com, one of the carriage agglomorators who will send a suitcase for less than it costs you to carry it with you on the cheap airlines. Recently sent to Miss Ham in Australia, it was a DHL service, picked up on Friday, in Oz on Sunday, cleared customs on Tuesday delivered same day, against a one week delivery promise.

Excellent tracking off DHL, plus alerts and service from sendmybag themselves.

link: https://www.sendmybag.com/?affid=100358 is a reward link giving an introductory 5% discount to you and 5% to me off my next bag (valid 12 months)

I'm another big fan of DPD, mainly for their one hour slots. We have several different drivers here but all seem to be pleasant and I always at least thank them. There's one who is almost always early and has to sit outside as he's told me he can't deliver before the beginning of the allotted hour. Of course if he didn't run up our very short drive maybe he wouldn't be early everywhere!

When we were in London we had an excellent guy from the Home Delivery Network who used an old Te$c0 trolley to deliver parcels...and always in the evening as he knew that way he'd get people.

I can't understand why more companies can't give an hour slot if DPD can do so....UPS now seem to give me morning or afternoon which helps but it's not guaranteed.

Further to your point about Online companies publishing details of which couriers they use... yes, absolutely. There were a couple of firms I used at least partly because they did stat that they used DPD. Without me noticing they've both since changed couriers....I only realized when I didn't get a text saying when my package was due. Shall think twice before using them again.

"I can't understand why more companies can't give an hour slot if DPD can do so."

I agree NiC, but suspect that it is due to reluctance to invest in the best software... but, very short-sighted as software is peanuts cf vehicle running costs and drivers' wages.

The DPD hour slots are even better if you go to their website - it provides a map showing what number drop on the round you are, and tracks where the driver currently is, and which number drop he is on. It also gives you an exact time for delivery, which is usually 3 or 4 minutes later than the van actually arrives.

A while back, I invested in a couple of hundred envelopes from Royal Mail with pre-paid postage - I think they cost me £60 for 100.

I don't use that many, but every one from here on is a profit, as I paid less postage than the current rate :-)