Don't miss a parcel delivery

This advice applies to England. See advice for See advice for Northern Ireland, See advice for Scotland, See advice for Wales

You might miss parcel deliveries or find it difficult to collect a parcel - for example if you’re disabled or have a health condition.

Your delivery company must give you a way to tell them what you need when having a parcel delivered or collecting a parcel. These are new rules by the communications regulator, Ofcom.

These could include asking your parcel company to:

  • knock loudly or use the doorbell

  • wait longer for you to answer the door

  • leave your parcel somewhere you can reach - for example, in a locker on the lowest row

If your parcel company ignores your delivery or collection needs, you should complain to them.

Getting a parcel delivered to your home

How you tell the parcel delivery company what you need depends on which company is delivering your parcel. 

Amazon Logistics

You can add your delivery needs to your Amazon order at checkout.

You can tell Amazon if you need their delivery person to:

  • ring the doorbell

  • knock loudly

  • give you more time to answer the door

  • not post your parcel through your letterbox

Add your delivery needs

You’ll need to:

  1. Select ‘Add delivery instructions’ under your delivery address

  2. Select that you have ‘Accessible delivery instructions to share’

  3. Select your delivery needs from the list 

  4. Click 'Save instructions'

If your delivery need isn’t listed:

  1. Select ‘My instruction isn’t listed’

  2. Select ‘Add more instructions’

  3. Under ‘Do we need additional instructions to find this address’ enter your delivery needs in this box

  4. Click 'Save instructions'

You can also add a place you would like your parcel left if it doesn’t fit through the letterbox.

DHL

You can tell DHL you need more time to get to the door on the DHL Parcel UK app or on the tracking website.

If you don’t want to download the app you can contact DHL customer services and they’ll save your delivery needs to your address.

DHL Customer Services

Telephone: 02476 937 770

Monday to Friday, 7am to 8pm

Saturday 8am to 6pm

Your call should be free if either:

  • your contract includes all calls to landlines 

  • you’re within your free minutes allowance for calls to landlines

You might be charged if your contract doesn’t include all calls to landlines or you’ve used all your free minutes. 

Check how much calls will cost.

DPD

You can tell DPD if you need more time to get to the door on their app. To do this:

  1. Select ‘Home address’ in the menu

  2. Scroll to ‘Preferences’

  3. Select ‘More Time Needed’ 

You can add a ‘leave safe’ space and preferred neighbour on the app or website. 

If you don’t want to download the app, contact DPD customer services and they’ll save your delivery needs to your address.

DPD Customer Services

Telephone: 0121 275 0500

Monday to Friday, 8am to 6.30pm

Saturday, 8am to 4pm

Sunday 9am to 3pm

Email: consumers@dpd.co.uk

 Your call should be free if either:

  • your contract includes all calls to landlines 

  • you’re within your free minutes allowance for calls to landlines

You might be charged if your contract doesn’t include all calls to landlines or you’ve used all your free minutes. 

Check how much a call will cost.

Evri

You can tell Evri your delivery needs on the day your parcel is being delivered.

Tell Evri if you need:

  • more time to answer the door

  • them to ring your doorbell instead of knocking

  • them to not leave the parcel blocking your doorway

Add your delivery needs

you'll need to:

  1. Click ‘Delivery options’ in your email

  2. Select ‘Doorstep Instructions’

  3. Select the options that apply to you

You can use the Evri app and website to add a safe place or preferred neighbour for your deliveries - it will take 24 hours for your settings to be saved. 

If you use a screen reader, you won’t be able to use the website or app to set delivery preferences. You’ll need to contact Evri's customer services.

Evri customer services

Telephone: 0330 808 5456

Monday to Friday, 8am to 4pm

Saturday, 8am to 2pm

Your call should be free if either:

  • your contract includes all calls to landlines 

  • you’re within your free minutes allowance for calls to landlines

You might be charged if your contract doesn’t include all calls to landlines or you’ve used all your free minutes. 

Check how much a call will cost.

Royal Mail and Parcelforce

You can add your delivery needs on the Royal Mail app or contact customer services.

Tell Royal Mail if you need:

  • the delivery person to knock louder

  • more time to get to your door

These settings will be linked to the address - if you live with people who have different needs, you should think about what works for everyone.

Add your delivery needs

On the Royal Mail app you'll need to:

  1. Go to ‘Manage account’ 

  2. Select ‘Address’

  3. Scroll down and select ‘Accessibility’

  4. Select ‘Knock louder’

  5. Select ‘More time required'

  6. Click 'Save'

If you don’t have the Royal Mail app you can contact customer services for your needs to be added to your address.

Royal Mail Customer Services

Telephone: 0345 774 0740

Monday to Friday, 8am to 6.30pm

Saturday 8am to 3pm

Sunday 9am to 2pm

Your call should be free if either:

  • your contract includes all calls to landlines 

  • you’re within your free minutes allowance for calls to landlines

You might be charged if your contract doesn’t include all calls to landlines or you’ve used all your free minutes. 

Check how much your call will cost.

Yodel

In the Yodel Parcel Tracker app you can add your delivery needs.

Under the ‘additional notes’ section you can tell Yodel if you need:

  • the delivery person to knock louder

  • more time to get to your door

If you don’t have the Yodel app, contact their customer services to have your needs added to your address.

Yodel Customer Services

Telephone: 0344 755 0117

Monday to Friday, 8am to 8pm

Saturday, 8am to 6pm

  • your contract includes all calls to landlines 

  • you’re within your free minutes allowance for calls to landlines

You might be charged if your contract doesn’t include all calls to landlines or you’ve used all your free minutes. 

Check how much a call will cost.

Collecting a parcel

You’ll need to know where you’re collecting your parcel from to know how to tell your parcel company your collection needs. For example, a locker, shop or collection point.

Amazon Locker

At the checkout on Amazon you’ll be asked how you’d like your parcel delivered. If you select an Amazon locker, you can ask for a locker which is closer to the ground. 

The lower lockers are between 38cm and 97cm from the ground.

Amazon locker’s are usually outside and open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

To select a locker closer to the ground:

  1. Go to your delivery address 

  2. Underneath the locker address, select ‘Use lower lockers’

If your Amazon Locker has a screen

The screen is usually in the middle of the lockers. Underneath the screen it will have:

  • a tactile headphone socket

  • keypad

  • instructions in Braille

Plug in your headphones to get audio instructions and use the keypad to pick up or return parcels.

If your Amazon Locker doesn’t have a screen

On your collection email there will be a button that says ‘Start pick up’. Press this when you reach your locker location.

If you’re blind or have sight loss you might need to use a screen reader on your phone to get the instructions.

InPost Locker

The locker will usually be outside and open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

If you need a locker close to the ground, use the InPost app to select the ‘Easy Access Zone’.

The Easy Access Zone lockers are between 30cm and 150cm from the ground.

To have your parcel delivered to the Easy Access Zone:

  1.  Go to your delivery in the InPost app

  2.  Select the question ‘Should I place the shipment in the Easy Access Zone’

You’ll get an email and a notification in the app when your parcel has been delivered. If it wasn’t possible to deliver your parcel to the Easy Access Zone, InPost will deliver it to the next available locker. 

Complain to the company who delivered your parcel to the locker, if your parcel wasn’t left in an Easy Access Zone. Take pictures to send with your complaint.

Post Office

You can arrange to have parcels delivered to your local Post Office branch. Check where you can collect parcels from on the Post Office website.

Some Post Offices have:

  • low counters

  • non-assisted wheelchair access - their website can include measurements for turning circles

  • induction loops if you're a hearing aid user

You can check if your Post Office is accessible - find your branch on the Post Office website.

Royal Mail Delivery Office or Customer Service Point

You might have missed your delivery or chosen to collect your parcel from a Royal Mail Customer Service Point (CSP) - these are usually in delivery offices.

If you missed your delivery you should have been left a ‘red card’. This will have the address and opening times of where you’ll need to collect your parcel.

You can ask for your parcel to be redelivered to your door check how to arrange a redelivery on the Royal Mail website

If you want to collect your parcel from a delivery office or CSP, you can check whether it’s accessible - find your nearest service by searching the location on the Royal Mail website.

Shop collection

You can arrange to collect parcels from newsagents, supermarkets and other shops with collection facilities.

You could arrange to collect parcels from different delivery companies from the same shop. 

You can check the accessibility of your collection location by searching for it online. 

Complaining to a parcel delivery company

If your delivery needs haven’t been listened to, you should complain to the parcel company using their complaints process. You may also get a response by complaining to them directly on social media. 

Check the parcel company’s website for details of their complaints process.

If your parcel company was delivering something on behalf of another company, you should complain to that company too. 

Check if you’re being discriminated against - check what counts as disability discrimination

What Citizens Advice is saying about this

Citizens Advice is responsible for checking if the parcel industry is following the rules and giving you a good service. 

Every year we rate the main parcel delivery companies and give them a score. Check our 2023 Parcels League Table

We want parcel companies to reduce the amount of delivery problems you face. We especially want to stop parcels being left in unsafe places, like wheelie bins or under cars.

We think Ofcom, the communications regulator, should:

  1. Launch a review of how the new rules are working by April 2024 - if your experience hasn’t improved we think Ofcom should think about fining parcel companies

  2.  Do more to understand the type of delivery problems you face when getting and sending parcels - and what can be done to reduce the amount of problems

If we don’t see improvements to your experience and to the accessibility scores in next year’s league table we’ll be asking Ofcom to take further action.

Tell us your experience

Sharing your experience of parcel companies with us, helps us understand the problems better. We can use this to know where we need to campaign for change in the parcel industry.

Tell us your experience of parcel companies by filling out this form.

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Page last reviewed on 27 November 2023