Mail delivery time from abroad
contrariness Posted messages 338 Registration date Status Membre Last intervention -
Hello,
On Monday, August 28, 2022, I sent four postcards each in envelopes to friends in France from Crete (Greece). Here we are on Wednesday, September 14, and none of my four recipients has received their mail. I would therefore like to get some answers by posting my question on this forum.
Why? Is this normal? Will my mail arrive?
7 réponses
Hello,
You are misinformed about the functions and possibilities of a forum, made up of subscribers like you and me, which cannot address any dysfunctions of a commercial service (or otherwise) and even less indicate the positioning of transported products. We have no connection with the administration of La Poste, a commercial activity that does not publish this kind of statistics.
Only personal experiences exist, like those of jag72, but they cannot in any way meet your expectations, as anyone can report delays, including for express mail, far exceeding the announced deadlines, for which you will find it very difficult to obtain a response from La Poste itself. Therefore, it is not appropriate to expect a result from moving within one of the categories of this forum, even if leisure/diversions is indeed surprising.
Only a complaint to the postal services (Greek) is appropriate, but I doubt they will respond, due to a lack of follow-up procedures, only possible if provided by the sender.
As a reminder, CCM is a support platform for mutual assistance and knowledge exchange on topics related to computing and the internet.
Hello,
I moved your question to "leisure/entertainment," which is the least inappropriate of the sub-forums on the site (the one about postal services indeed concerns webmail, not postal shipments...)
As for the substance... it's quite difficult to answer you.... there is neither tracking nor guarantee with "simple" shipments.... especially from one country to another...
Good evening,
Is my mail going to arrive?
It's impossible to know here through a forum in an exact way and with absolute certainty! A one in two chance...
Hello.
Indeed, brucine; it is common for mail sent from France to Pointe-Noire in Congo to take a detour via Pointe-Noire in Guadeloupe, or for letters intended for St-Claude in the Jura to end up in my naval town, St-Claude in Guadeloupe!
You are also right; the postmen in Crete are used to tourists speaking all languages; but what is possible in Chania or Heraklion is not necessarily true in Sitia or Voutas...
Retirement is great! Especially in the Antilles...
Raymond (INSA, AFPA)
Hello,
it's also very common for some unscrupulous postal workers to take the stamps, especially from postcards.
Sicilians are specialists in this kind of trickery.
In case of doubt, put it in an envelope; it avoids showing the little value of a postcard...
See you later blux "The idiots dare everything.
That's even how we recognize them."
The ideal is to write the destination country in the language of the departure country and in English. Once it arrives in the destination country, the postal code and the city take over.
In modern countries, postal sorting is automated and handwritten addresses are misinterpreted by scanners. If the translation is also incorrect, the mail is directed who knows where..
For example, many Chinese websites require addresses to be written in English, meaning without accented letters.
Hello gugus.
If the addresses on the 4 envelopes are handwritten in French, the Cretan officials didn't understand anything!
If you had written in Aramaic, Arabic, or Chinese, it would have been the same!
If the addresses were printed, or very carefully calligraphed, there is a small chance that the Greek officials managed to scan and then translate those addresses; but multiple errors may have crept in...
To your question "will my mail arrive," I would therefore reply "there's a 1 in ten thousand chance that it will, and 9,999 that it won't"!
Retirement is great! Especially in the Caribbean...
Raymond (INSA, AFPA)
Hello,
This is a particularly reductive stance and doubtlessly far from postal operations, even if they are sometimes erratic... Indeed, the only information that the Cretan postal workers need to consider is "France" ... Then, upon arrival on French soil, the postal code... and the other subsequent elements must be taken into account by postal workers who are supposed to know how to read them............
Hello,
Regarding randomness, many years ago I sent a letter from France to my brother, where the country was clearly stated, he then lived in a town named Poland (Ohio).
My letter came back to me a few months later from Poland, but this does not suggest a greater randomness in Crete where I assume the postal workers deal with hordes of tourists and are used to addresses in all languages.
Good evening,
There are certainly no shortage of examples of absurdities in postal delivery... between addresses that are sometimes written in a fanciful way and the interpretation of addresses that are correct, there is definitely a mix... Moreover, the press loves to report on mail that has arrived with a delay of 30 or 40... years... However, at the same time, it is excessive to want to make these "fancies" a generalization.
;-)