“It seems to have been delivered haphazardly,” says Ella van Dijk. “There was even mail for a supermarket in Sint Maartenszee, but otherwise mainly for Pettemers.” She decides to post a message on Facebook, asking if people happen to be waiting for mail.
“I added a photo and put the addresses down,” she says. “Then I received a lot of messages from people asking if their mail was included.”
‘People are happy when they receive mail’
She asks these people to pick up their mail from her, or she delivers it herself. In this way she has already been able to get a lot of mail to the right recipients. “People are very happy when they finally get their mail.”
She has just returned from delivering mail in Petten, when NH speaks to her by telephone. During the conversation her other phone rings. She answers. “There’s a package here for him, and a letter for you,” she tells the caller. It goes on all day, she says.
Approval from other Pettemers
“Some people say my heart is too big to leave it in the mailboxes,” says Ella. “But it even includes funeral mail. If people only receive it a week later, then the funeral has already taken place.”
Other Pettemers have offered to help her deliver the mail, but that goes too far for her. “I’m not a postman. PostNL should solve it.”
She has already contacted PostNL several times. Yesterday the remainder of the mail and packages were picked up by a postman. PostNL informed NH that they have apologized and that they will deliver flowers to Ella as soon as possible.
PostNL has no explanation yet
“We are still investigating what exactly happened here,” says Stijn Wesselink, spokesperson for PostNL. “So we do not yet have an explanation for the found mail. Presumably someone outside the regular delivery team helped in the neighborhood in question and it did not go entirely well.”
He continues: “This should obviously not happen and we are still in discussions with the delivery partner and are also taking measures to prevent this from happening again.”
Wesselink further confirms that a permanent postal worker in Petten has been sought for some time. “But that search is difficult.”