Last week it rained complaints about undelivered mail from all over Hoofddorp, from Overbos to Toolenburg. PostNL confirms that a personnel problem in a distribution center was the reason for the delay.
More than a hundred responses were received after two residents of Hoofddorp complained on Facebook about the missing post. From the beginning of last week, the letters suddenly stopped arriving. And for some this had quite dire consequences.
A resident of Toolenburg missed a funeral due to the lack of mail: “I received a funeral card much too late. I saw someone jump off a mobility scooter and he threw something in my mailbox. I was so surprised that I didn’t go after it. The card It was so late that I couldn’t go to the funeral.”
Staff shortages
When asked, a PostNL spokesperson can confirm that there were problems with mail delivery in the area: “There was an occupancy problem in a depot. We, like many other sectors, are experiencing staff shortages. Unfortunately, we cannot do this from one to the next.” solve it another day.”
To clear the backlog, the company called in ‘an external party’ to visit as many places as possible last Sunday and Monday. This in turn led to some surprise among those affected, who, after a week without a postman, suddenly saw up to three people passing by in one day.
The external mail deliverers receive compliments for their hard work, albeit somewhat chaotic. This was also the case on Sunday, from this person from Hoofddorp: Delivering mail with two people on our list today, in this weather. That is worth a compliment.”
For another resident, the post on Sunday came as a surprise: “They knew nothing, the delivery people came from Amsterdam. That’s all I heard. Really strange, nothing all week and now ten items through the mail here. “
The PostNL spokesperson explains the situation with the staff shortages: “We need around 15,000 postal workers nationally every day. We are now short of a thousand. Due to a few unfortunate cases of illness, for example, you can experience problems with delivery.”
According to PostNL, the delivery backlog is no more important in Haarlemmermeer than in other regions and provinces. To reduce the chance of a recurrence in Hoofddorp, a number of the external mail deliverers from last week are being trained. Then the occupancy of the distribution depot, among other things, should be in order again.