'Fragile' parcel tape

JezWynd

It clearly identifies the contents as needing care while handling, is this a red rag to a bull?
Good idea or not? 

ICBM

At best a waste of time because conveyor belts can't read, at worst a red rag to an employee who is having a bad day.

If you're relying on writing fragile on something to protect it, either you have no idea how mail handling systems work or you shouldn't be sending the item in the first place, at least without packing it a lot better.

In my mail-order packing job we just use it for everything whether it's fragile or not, purely because it's slightly better tape than the usual brown stuff - I have no idea why!

Octafish

Hard to say, depends how lucky/unlucky you are with who handles it. When I worked for Royal Mail years ago I had to deal with a pissed off customer who had got home to find a folded in half envelope on their door mat. The envelope contained photos and was one of those card backed/reinforced envelopes with 'Please Do Not Bend' on it. The bellend postie had scribbled "Do Not" out, bent it in half and shoved it through the letterbox .

ICBM

Octafish said:

Hard to say, depends how lucky/unlucky you are with who handles it. When I worked for Royal Mail years ago I had to deal with a pissed of customer who had got home to find a folded in half envelope on their door mat. The envelope contained photos and was one of those card backed/reinforced envelopes with 'Please Do Not Bend' on it. The bellend postie had scribbled "Do Not" out, bent it in half and shoved it through the letterbox .

That's why, when I sold some of my vinyl on Ebay many years ago, I got some old 4mm or 5mm plywood and cut 7" and 12" squares out of it, and put one in with every record... not absolutely impossible to bend, but close enough. I think on a couple of the most valuable albums I put one each side. It increased the postage cost a bit though.

Elwood

You could try putting a "shockwatch impact indicator" on it. They are sometimes used with shipping equipment. 

mgaw

dont know whether its a red rag etc but it is really good tape

Haych

Octafish said:

Hard to say, depends how lucky/unlucky you are with who handles it. When I worked for Royal Mail years ago I had to deal with a pissed off customer who had got home to find a folded in half envelope on their door mat. The envelope contained photos and was one of those card backed/reinforced envelopes with 'Please Do Not Bend' on it. The bellend postie had scribbled "Do Not" out, bent it in half and shoved it through the letterbox .

I once saw one better than this, a customer had ordered photo prints online and it was sent in a stiff cardboard envelope with the words PHOTOS DO NOT BEND clearly printed in big type.

The postie wrote underneath "Oh yes they do" before bending it in half and shoving it through the customer's letterbox.

Whitecat

Have heard that the only message on the outside of a box that might actually get paid attention to by a handler is "contains glass" (in addition to "Fragile"). "Fragile" on its own won't necessarily aggravate the handling but it will likely be summarily ignored.

Octafish

Haych said:

Octafish said:

Hard to say, depends how lucky/unlucky you are with who handles it. When I worked for Royal Mail years ago I had to deal with a pissed off customer who had got home to find a folded in half envelope on their door mat. The envelope contained photos and was one of those card backed/reinforced envelopes with 'Please Do Not Bend' on it. The bellend postie had scribbled "Do Not" out, bent it in half and shoved it through the letterbox .

I once saw one better than this, a customer had ordered photo prints online and it was sent in a stiff cardboard envelope with the words PHOTOS DO NOT BEND clearly printed in big type.

The postie wrote underneath "Oh yes they do" before bending it in half and shoving it through the customer's letterbox.

Ha, ha we had one of those too, plus a postie stopping to take a shit in someone's back garden...

Fretwired

Depends how its being shipped. UPS recommend it and claim they do take notice along with big stickers saying 'this way up' .. should also help with any claim if you take photos. A courier company can hardly say 'you shouldn't have done that as our couriers will always abuse parcels with fragile tape on it' ... :-)

Bygone_Tones

If you ever need to make a claim it helps if you have written fragile on the box. Instead of tape I tend to just write FRAGILE in huge letters with a large marker, and then draw a box around it to make it look bigger. It's cheaper, and a lot more visible and a lot more likely to get noticed by the courier, than tape.

Gagaryn

ICBM said:

Octafish said:

Hard to say, depends how lucky/unlucky you are with who handles it. When I worked for Royal Mail years ago I had to deal with a pissed of customer who had got home to find a folded in half envelope on their door mat. The envelope contained photos and was one of those card backed/reinforced envelopes with 'Please Do Not Bend' on it. The bellend postie had scribbled "Do Not" out, bent it in half and shoved it through the letterbox .

That's why, when I sold some of my vinyl on Ebay many years ago, I got some old 4mm or 5mm plywood and cut 7" and 12" squares out of it, and put one in with every record... not absolutely impossible to bend, but close enough. I think on a couple of the most valuable albums I put one each side. It increased the postage cost a bit though.

Records always seem to make it through the post unscathed in standard record mailers - I've bought and sold hundreds without any issue. A more important precaution is to remove the record from the coveras they tend to move within the cover and split the seems. It bugs me when sellers do not do this.

JezWynd

Elwood said:

You could try putting a "shockwatch impact indicator" on it. They are sometimes used with shipping equipment. 

Interesting, I'd never heard of that system before. Thanks.

Gagaryn

JezWynd said:

Elwood said:

You could try putting a "shockwatch impact indicator" on it. They are sometimes used with shipping equipment. 

Interesting, I'd never heard of that system before. Thanks.

I discovered them on Mythbusters. :-)

Phil_aka_Pip

Potentially useful when moving if you have a half-decent removals firm, but of no value if they are cowboys and definitely useless for couriered goods.

stuartm1962

If you are sending it by courier,it is only the staff that manually handle it that will see it. As most of it is sorted mechanically, it won't make much difference. If you are sending a guitar,make sure it's in a hard case, loosen the strings and fill any voids with foam peanuts or crumpled newspaper, to stop it moving about.Use as much bubble wrap as possible to avoid any damage. https://www.overlandexpress.co.uk/instrumentcourier