The Dutch postal market BADLY needs competition! I've never known a worse service than TNT in the Netherlands.
In the five years I've lived here I have had many items of mail never turn up - of course parcels are the most common thing to disappear, but my husband also had money stolen from a birthday card. (Ok I realise it's not a good idea to send money through the mail, but the card was delivered...minus the money, so they proved their reliability and honesty right there...)
Currently I'm waiting for two packages, one of which has been sent twice, the first time it was returned to sender in the USA - we don't know why. It was re-sent out over a month ago and now we don't know where it is....and the tracking service cross countries is pointless. So we could track it to New York...after that forget it, no way of knowing where it is.
In the last place I lived, we regularly received the slip telling you a parcel has been delivered, for someone else in our building...and even saw those slips lying on the floor beside the mailboxes from time to time.
The staff of TNT evidently don't give a damn about what they're doing and we customers have NO comeback on this either.
Wow, whilst I've been writing this one of my awaited packages just arrived, problem is, it's ripped open and some things are missing....now what do I do? I've tried ringing the customer service line for TNT before and those people just do not help - if they even answer the phone I mean. I have now informed everyone we know not to send us parcels any more, its not worth it.

By Hilary | February 9, 2010 11:49 AM

I have lived and worked in three different countries now and I have to say TNT are simply the worst postal authority I have ever dealt with in all my years, so many letters I receive, that are not even close to the address listed on the mail, so many times parcels coming to me have been opened, the contents stolen. Somethings mailed to me never make it, even from across town, and TNT have 'claimed' to attempted to deliver parcels to my residence, as I was home, and claimed no one was home. Parcels returned to sender at cost, even though correct address was on parcel, etc.etc.etc...
This company allows all of this to exist and doesn't seem to interested in listening to it's customers and providing a better service. They are content with employee theft of private mail, because this happens more often than anyone at TNT is willing to admit...
And it is all this country has for a postal service...wow...
The government needs to open this market to other competition, because there is no incentive to be reliable, honest or competent...
TNT is the absolute worst........

By Ken | February 9, 2010 12:20 PM

Yes TNT really sucks!

If a parcel arrives and you're not at home, they just dump it with one of your neighbours, I hate that!

Last year I sent a Valentine's to my GF in Manila. I had to register the damn thing, total cost of €12,. At least she got the card! Previous attempts of unregistered mail failed...

By stevie | February 9, 2010 1:18 PM

are you sure it is tnt to blame? We get mail in the middle of the night delivered by a man in a white van - the address he uses when you were not home is a hotmail one.

Lots of post from the UK does not go through TNT at all, but its competitors - who seem to deliver whenever they feel like it. Birthday presents posted on the same day in the same place in the Uk arrived four weeks apart. Missing magazines mysteriously turned up in one batch after I began complaining to white van man's hotmail address.

And who do you complain to? Its a nightmare - no one claims responsiblity.

By shirley | February 9, 2010 2:05 PM

I've never heard of that Shirley...what area do you live in? It might depend on the part of the country.
I've lived in Zaandam and Amsterdam and have always had TNT deliver to me (or not!) so I truly think they are terrible, yes!
As far as who to complain to, I agree with you - there is no accountability. Oh, I also thought I'd try to use Fedex one time to send a package to England, and they told me that they only deal with items of great value (over 500 euros I think it was), so I don't know if there is any other choice than TNT.

By Hilary | February 9, 2010 2:45 PM

TNT SUCKS SO BAD!!! I work at a company that ship with them all the time. Not only do they mess up all the time, like described above, but their customer service is CRAP AND they hide their phone number on the website. They need some competition to get them out of the stone age :(

By Kamila | February 11, 2010 2:12 PM

The 3rd package mailed to me this year has just disappeared without trace. TNT cannot track it because it came airmail from the USA and carried no bar code. Is there any effective way to complain?

By Maureen Phillips | February 25, 2010 12:32 PM