Far from being a reputable delivery service, recent experience has suggested to me that DPD might be an elaborate joke, or perhaps a social experiment created with the intent of establishing how far a person's endurance might be pushed through sheer exasperation. This is a long review, summarised way below, if you do not wish to read the full catalogue of nonsense. DPD twice apparently attempted to deliver a parcel to me, only once leaving a note to say so, providing a tracking number. Having succeeded in tracking it online, I discovered that said parcel was to be delivered to a pharmacy for me to pick up; one with business hours which did not coincide with a time I could reach them (namely Monday-Friday, during hours when I was at work out of town.) Seemingly the concept of commuting, common in this country for perhaps 150 years, is not one which DPD are aware of. Additionally hilariously, the phone number they had for me was not functional, having been provided with it by my mobile phone network - and DPD were delivering a phone inextricably linked with that SIM, which was lying useless in my home. This problem alone was not the fault of DPD. I was able to talk to a member of DPD staff, using a phone number which is not publicised on their website, to rearrange delivery of the parcel on the next Saturday. It took three attempts to confirm that this was done, having twice been put on hold and not phoned back, as custom and good business sense might dictate. When I checked their tracker on Saturday, however, the computer system linked to it was down, and DPD could not provide me with an intelligible answer - over perhaps three calls - whether it might be delivered to me that day. I was wrongly told that there might be a delay in my recieving email notification that the parcel was on its way; rather, I received no message at all. They could not even tell me whether it has been "scanned into" the van, or indeed off it when I called again later that day. DPD stole a day of my precious free time by insisting that I stayed at home to pick up a parcel which they could not confirm the existence of, and never arrived - one which I could not pick up from their depot after a day of non-delivery, it further transpired. During the course of this fiasco, a DPD employee assured me that he would call me back that afternoon on my landline, and did not. In a further hilarious twist, it has emerged when re-arranging delivery that DPD cannot add additional contact numbers for a person to their system. Eventually I was notified by further email that my parcel had been delivered to the shop I could not reach. Fortunately, my partner was going to work later than usual one day shortly afterwards, and would be able to pick it up for me, or so I thought. Having received a strong dose of nonsense already, I phoned DPD to check whether this would be feasible, only to be told that as per their protocol, for someone to pick it up they would have to have the same surname as me, and carry a bewildering array of identification. Not even a council letter with both of our names, and the same address would be enough; government-mandated acceptance of cohabitation, it seems, was not good enough for DPD, who insist that a person must either be married or a ward of their parents to be worthy of their service! One must either conform to their morals or be defrauding the authorities. I was given the lame excuse that this was due to data protection; it cannot, for this has nothing to do with the processing of personal information or the security of data. The fact that other services such as Parcel Force would see this as more than enough ID was brushed aside, and although admitting that this system was flawed, that this issue is a common occurrence, the call handler professed to be unable to do anything because it was a protocol, a holy and untouchable thing he could do nothing about beyond ask that I complain myself - which I declined in light of how much of my time DPD had already wasted. (In light of the irony of mentioning this in a complaint I should add that it is being written on my commute, having finished my book.) In the end, my partner was able to pick up the package, having called the shop who were happy to accept the identification and documents we could arrange. It transpires, then, that DPD has a call centre staffed with persons who know nothing of their own processes. They were particularly amused by the arrival of a parcel festooned with handwritten labels stating that it was to be delivered Saturday, and to my home. In short, if you wish to have parcels lost, experience dreadful customer service (perhaps 1/4 call handlers were helpful, although those who were could only be called exceptional), and see the folly of an excessively bureaucratic organisation operating at weekends but excepting its IT staff from this duty (they fixed the tracking system early on a Monday, suggesting a minor, and perhaps easily corrected fault), I recommend DPD with every fibre of my body. Otherwise don't bother with having anything to do with this farcical organisation.