"I had the best experience with DHL. The delivery person arrived at my home when no one was there. She called my cell and when the call went to voicemail, she texted me, then called again to let me know she had a package for me. When I answered the second call i asked her if she could leave the package by the back door and she agreed, 100% polite and friendly the whole way. In a day and age when UPS has become known for throwing packages over the fence and FedEx workers are accused of stealing puppies from back yards, this was a very positive, refreshing experience. Way to go, DHL!"
"A store sent me a package from China and the sender forgot to inform my CPF (SSN or tax number) on the invoice. After a week, it arrived in Brazil and will be RETURNED to the sender.
I paid for shipping expensive (about USD 100 for a small package) and the DHL offices in China know of this requirement of the Brazilian customs, and has a rule preventing the posting of orders without this information. Even so, they received the order without the CPF, and after waiting one week, I'll have to wait for the resend to the sender to send again. And probably will still want to charge a new freight.
A company that charges so high value for the service would have to be more careful. I'd like to at least DHL expedite the return of order, for free."
"Unfortunately my only encounter with DHL will be probably the last one. Had a small item ordered for my Sunday wedding. Delivery was scheduled for Wednesday before, so plenty of time. On Wednesday 'unable to locate' appeared on their website and customer service centre told me the address is incomplete. Even though I tried repeatedly contact customer service centre myself and also the merchant who posted the parcel, the redelivery was not attempted until Tuesday after my wedding that is 4 working days + weekend when they could try to deliver.
Despite having my mobile phone and full cooperation (I was sitting at home since Wednesday till Friday 9pm) I had only one response from customer service 'It should be delivered tomorrow.'. Also the customer service confirmed to me, that the address in their system is ok and they have no idea why the driver marked it as unable to locate. Also... I checked the address given to the merchant and it includes a postcode and name exclusive to our apartment building which is not same anywhere in the country.
Finally, when they first really attempted to deliver my item, and because I really was not interested in spending my honeymoon waiting for a parcel at home, they have left it with neighbours - without a call, trying to contact me otherwise, even any card advising which of 8x16 flats of our apartment building they left it in.
To sum it up, the worst service ever I received in any country, and would never recommend their services to anyone. My merchant have now serious troubles to locate the parcel for me and probably would have to refund all the money on top of the troubles they already have to go through."
"Most of my problems with DHL stem from their DHL@Home service, which means they give packages to self-employed carriers to deliver at their leisure. The delivery window is 7:00-21:00 (14 hours), over a two-day period, and I have even heard of carriers attempting delivery as late as 23:00! This includes DHL Express packages, so "Next Day" packages can (and often do, in my experience) take TWO days to arrive. Go figure.
A few things I have learned through my (bad) experiences with DHL@Home:
- Packages are given to the drivers and they can keep them indefinitely, so even though a tracking number shows as "out for delivery" they may not come that day. I have had drivers keep packages for several days.
- Drivers pretend to attempt delivery. Tracking will show "attempted delivery - card left" when nobody has been. No delivery, no card. This has happened at multiple addresses and with many different drivers so I assume it is an institutionalised problem. One time, the timestamp on an "attempt" even occurred when my partner and I were both standing outside in the front garden, so there is no way we could have missed the delivery person.
Service from DHL@Home is abysmal. When you can't trust a delivery company to stick to their promised delivery dates or to be truthful about trying to deliver your packages, what else is there?"
"I ordered an item with an online merchant that was sent through DHL on Jan 17. It was scheduled to arrive at my door Jan 22, but I received a notification from DHL on Jan 21 that the package had been delivered. Since I had not received the package, I called them and was informed that the package was delivered to a different address on my street. Apparently, the driver had decided that the two addresses and names were similar enough (began with the same letter) that he routed my package to be delivered with someone else's package to their house. It was schedule to be picked up and delivered the next day, Jan 22.
On Jan 22 I called back and they said that the package was not yet delivered, that the first story was in error. I called back again later and was told that the package had been delivered, and would be picked up and delivered on the next day, Jan 23.
On Jan 23 the DHL delivery person arrived with my package. I asked him what happened, and he stated that the delivery person had delivered the package to the wrong address, but not the one told to me in the first story from DHL. "That was a controller error" he stated.
I have the package, a day late. But it required 5+ phone calls from me, involved 4 different stories from DHL, and they've lost my trust completely. If I have the option in the future, I will not choose DHL. If I don't have other options, I'll keep an eye on them like a hawk, especially if I care much about my packages arriving at the correct addresses."