Australia Post to pay couple $3100 after refusing to deliver packages

A couple running a home business has been awarded $3100 after a standoff with an Australia Post worker that saw the postal service blacklist their address and demand they walk to the post office to receive their parcels.

It’s a case that will ring true to many business owners infuriated by Australia Post’s five-day freeze on parcel deliveries during the Father’s Day weekend last year.

It all began in 2019 when the Victorian couple noticed they were somehow missing most of their deliveries — half of which were related to the party hire business they run.

They told the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) they were often home during the delivery windows, but say a postal worker did not ring their doorbell to attempt delivery.

They continued that oftentimes there wasn’t even a postal slip left behind to show a delivery was attempted and a parcel was waiting for them at the local post office.

During March and April 2020, the couple began a home renovation and had removed their outside staircase, conceding that it would’ve been hard for the postal worker to deliver packages then.

But the pair say Australia Post never resumed door deliveries, even after the staircase went back in — one time, they said, a parcel was thrown up their outside staircase to their front door.

They complained to Australia Post in October 2019 about the shoddy service but received no reply. So they complained again in May 2020 — this time to the local post office and to their delivery driver directly.

During one delivery on the front lawn, one half of the couple told the driver that he had complained — so the driver “snatched the parcel back”, according to tribunal documents.

Things heated up when the driver told the couple they could pick up their parcels from the post office instead, even supposedly confirming the blacklisting on the phone to his manager.

They received a letter in the mail days after which directed them to go to the post office for packages instead — since that date, the couple told the court that only Express Post parcels by a different postal worker had been delivered.

They ended up lodging a complaint with the Ombudsman before going to the VCAT, claiming Australia Post was breaching its responsibilities under Australian Consumer Law.

A representative for Australia Post told the tribunal it had “determined that there was no safe way for this driver to deliver to this address”, and clarified it was “just one driver who could not deliver parcels”.

The judge found that one of the couple “had yelled and sworn at the driver” but nonetheless there was no reason parcels should have stopped altogether.

The judge awarded the couple $3100.50 — determined by adding the time it takes to travel to the local post office, park a car and the average wait time in line, and multiplying it by one half of the couple’s nearly $80 hourly salary.

The pair asked VCAT for an injunction to require parcels be delivered to their address again — but the judge told them the tribunal didn’t have that power.

In a statement to SmartCompany, an Australia Post spokesperson said the mail carrier “regret[s] the situation”.

“We know there are frustrations with carding and are working with our teams to reduce the need for it,” the spokesperson continued.

“Over the course of the past two years, Australia Post has had some of its busiest days ever, and consistently delivered 2 million parcels every weekday in December.”

The spokesperson added that Australia Post is always striving to do better.