Royal Mail 2D Tracking numbers duplicate number
Ilja Lissov
Hello,
Thank you for bringing this to our attention.
May we please have the order ID of this sale in Linnworks? We will look into it and try to identify the possible cause of that.
Thank you.
Best regards,
Ilja Lissov
Tech Support
it's 122809
The outcome of this was that the customer recieved their parcel successfully and the tracking details were overwritten by the updated delivery scan so you see no history of the tracking number, screenshot shows what it used to display.
I pressed Royal Mail again about this and they said it is a glitch in the system and happens rarely, although they also tried to convince me that the tracking number is only used for delivery confirmation and not tracking through their system. A quick google shows their marketing info about their 2d numbers claim to track the item through 'key stages' of their system, note the plural, so not sure how useful this system will be in the long term.
Regards,
Phil.
Ilja Lissov
Hello,
Thanks for coming back to me with the example.
As far as I can see the order has the same tracking number as the one on the screen shot. Is the one I am looking in the order an updated tracking number or the old one? Or simply was the delivery date different before compared to what it is now?
We used to have an issue in Linnworks where the system would generate duplicate numbers, but this must have been resolved. This occurs very rarely.
Are Royal Mail saying that it was a glitch from their side this time?
Best regards,
Ilja Lissov
Tech Support
Well it certainly is occuring often enough to worry me, I've now got a 3 cases where the customer has not recieved their item and it is showing as being delivered before it is being dispatched (by about a year earlier)
If you want to look at this one its order 123505 dispatched on 24th April 2017 RM say it was delivered as per screen shot attached on 19th May 2016.
The customer has not yet recieved the item as of today, what happens when (if) it is delivered, based on the other two, is the new record overwrites the old record so you have no history other than screen shots to show reuse of tracking numbers.
Given I do not check all tracking numbers we ship and only look when we get a customer query I am concerned that this happens on a more frequent basis than the 3 examples I've had to date following customer queries making the sytem pointless for relying upon to prove delivery took place.
Regards,
Phil.
I am told by my Royal Mail account Manager that Linnworks issue these tracking codes so what is going on?
Regards,
Phil.
Phil Rendell
I just received a complaint from a customer that the tracking details shows their parcel was delivered on 6th April 2016 which is impressive as I posted it on 27th March 2017
I spoke with Royal Mail and they confirmed it was a duplicate Tracking Number which I find amazing/appalling as it casts a doubt on the whole validity of the system.
Would be interested to hear if anyone else has recieved this as an issue to understand if it is a widespread problem or not.
Regards,
Phil.