Once upon a Tuesday in November. On that day, the odyssey of an apparently lost package began, an overwhelmed DHL employee and a Berliner in anxious and quiet anticipation of that package.
Although according to the DHL status report it was already loaded into a delivery vehicle at 11:11 a.m., at 8:17 p.m. the same day it said: "Unfortunately, delivery of the shipment was not possible today." Possible reasons given for this were "abortion of the delivery tour due to illness, accident, exceeding the working hours". "We'll try the next business day," DHL said.
The following Wednesday - new day, new luck. At 10:47 a.m., the package is loaded into the vehicle and should be delivered the same day. However, for the remainder of Wednesday there was no news from DHL, nor a courier at the recipient's door.
24 hours later, on Thursday around 10 a.m., the package was loaded back into a delivery vehicle. And again: there are no updates in the shipment tracking during the day.
Friday, 6:10 p.m.: Same message again. "The shipment is being prepared for loading into the delivery vehicle." Joachim Hesse, the recipient of the package, apparently no longer believed that the package could still arrive that Friday.
On Twitter he writes: "Post in Berlin remains a gamble. Let's see what Saturday brings (or doesn't bring). What do you bet on in my DHL lottery - will the package arrive tomorrow or not?" A user commented on the post and hoped: "Maybe tomorrow there will be this one chosen delivery man who can break the loop and give you a happy ending!"
Saturday followed. Joachim Hesse was still waiting for his package. When it is still not there in the late afternoon, he takes matters into his own hands to deliver the package. "I used my evening walk to look for my package. Thanks to live tracking, I found the DHL delivery truck," he tweeted. He felt sorry for the parcel carrier: "At 4:30 p.m. he was still 'more than 20 delivery stops' away from me – that would never have arrived."
The Berliner criticizes the planning and organization of the parcel service: "The problem is actually not with the deliverer, but with the supervisors who plan such endless tours. If at least the other side started the next day so that something would arrive ... "
Sources: Twitter Joachim Hesse, TZ
