We tested the Post Office’s parcel delivery — and the results were shocking

MyBroadband has been waiting for a parcel sent from Gqeberha (Port Elizabeth) to Centurion for eight months (238 calendar days, 163 working days), and it finally arrived — back at the sender’s address.

The parcel contained a GPS tracker and was sent with the Post Office’s ordinary mail service.

This means we did not get a tracking number and could only track the parcel using the tracker’s interface.

It formed part of a test of the Post Office’s parcel delivery capabilities that started at the beginning of 2022.

We sent four packages between Centurion and Port Elizabeth — two ordinary mail and two registered mail.

While this parcel did arrive at a post office near its destination after 64 days, no one could help us find it as we did not have a tracking number and never received a collection slip.

Eventually, the parcel took a trip to Johannesburg before setting off to Durban after 184 days.

We hope it had a lovely beach holiday before returning to Port Elizabeth.

After a nice coastal drive, the parcel arrived back at the sender’s home address — 238 days after being sent.

Curiously, the parcel was delivered to the physical address instead of the standard procedure of sending a collection slip and asking the receiver to collect the package from the Post Office.

Had the Post Office decided to do this when the parcel was close to the original destination, it would have saved about six months.

This round trip took nearly eight months or 163 working days, and the parcel was still not delivered.

We will send it back to the office with a reliable courier, which should take less than a week based on previous tests.

This concluded our 2022 Post Office parcel delivery test.

The table below summarises the results.

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