West Harptree residents' anger as hundreds of Evri parcels still undelivered

Residents in a Somerset village say more than 200 hundred Evri parcels, some of which were ordered before Christmas, have still not been delivered.

Residents say the delivery company has failed to deliver more than 200 parcels to West Harptree in the Chew Valley, Pauline Hemus claims.

Pauline Hemus is one of those affected by the delays. She said that her parcels - some of which were Christmas presents - have been missing since early December.

She told ITV News West Country: "On the 27th (December) I was messaged to say two parcels had been delivered to my house and they hadn’t, so I asked on the village Facebook group whether anybody had had my parcels, and I got inundated by people saying they had the same message.

"So I said if anyone wants to send me some tracking numbers I’ll look into it.

"I've now got over 200 people with tracking numbers, all from late November until Christmas."

Evri apologised for the delays, saying that the Christmas period has meant a number of challenges for the company.

The courier company added that people should expect their parcels over the next few days.

Pauline said it is not the first time this has happened, and thinks the delays are in part due to a change in delivery driver.

She said: "The first Evri delivery driver who knew the area well no longer works for the company, so I think other drivers are struggling to find our houses. It's difficult to find places in the village.

"I also had parcels that were supposed to be delivered that went back because they said 'we couldn’t find your address'."

Pauline says she got in touch with Evri who told her there had been delays which they would look into.

She added: "But nobody ever came back to me and then a second time when I listed 110 tracking numbers for them to look into, they told me they were all being sent back to the sender."

After enquiring about the tracking numbers of residents in the village, Pauline says Evri told her they would be unable to look into anyone else's parcel apart from her own.

She says a number of her own parcels were Christmas gifts, so she's been left "frustrated" by her experiences.

"The main problem is that if you get a message which says it's been delivered its difficult to get your money back and it's a lot of effort having to get through to get your money back. It's just really frustrating.

"It's the inconvenience of it all - and because we live in villages out of Bristol and Bath we do rely on the net for deliveries."

However, Pauline says that some people in the village have reported their parcels arriving over the last few days.

She said: "Apparently there's now a van going round the villages giving out the parcels.

"Fingers crossed they are dealing with it, we are all very hopeful that it will be resolved."

A spokesperson from Evri said: "During the busy Christmas period we, like other parcel companies, faced a unique set of challenges, including unprecedented volumes and the Royal Mail strikes but despite this, due to the incredible efforts from our local teams, we successfully delivered over 3 million parcels each day.

"In some local areas there are still some delayed parcels that should be cleared over the next few days and we apologise for any inconvenience and disappointment."