The matter in summary Residents of Fresvik, a village by the Sognefjord, are frustrated with PostNord’s package deliveries. The packages often end up in Balestrand, on the other side of the fjord, which requires over two hours by car and two ferry crossings across the Sognefjord. PostNord does not have parcel delivery at the local store in Fresvik, but Posten does. PostNord replies, among other things, that their system does not take ferry departures into account. They are aware of the problem and promise to improve the offer for residents in the area “during early autumn”. The residents want to be able to choose which supplier the parcels will be sent with. The summary is made by an AI service from OpenAI. The content is quality assured by news’s journalists before publication. – This one has been on a bit of a tour, says Bjarne Bjørkevoll and laughs heartily. The pensioner lives in the village of Fresvik by the Sognefjord, with around 200 permanent residents. He ordered the tiny plastic part for a carpet washer in an online store because he couldn’t choose a shipping supplier. Before the package arrived, it went via Mo i Rana and was handed over to Bergen, then traveled back to the East before finally ending up in Vik i Sogn. The pensioner had to pick it up there, about seven miles by car from his home village. Bjørkevoll is one of the residents scratching their heads about parcel delivery to PostNord. Further out in the fjord is Balestrand, where the packages often end up. Photo: Oda Flaten Lødemel / news Sogn Avis first wrote about Bjørkevoll and the package at Noregsferie. They have previously written several cases about the challenges with PostNord in the village. Does not deliver to the local store But picking up in Vik is not the worst – it is rather preferable, according to Bjørkevoll. Too often the parcels sent via PostNord end up in Balestrand, on the other side of the fjord – and in another municipality. A journey totaling just over two hours by car, including two ferry crossings across the Sognefjord. Fresvik lies along the Sognefjord and belongs to Vik municipality. The parcels often end up on the other side of the Sognefjord, in Balestrand, which belongs to Sogndal municipality. – There will be a few hundred Swedish kroner in expenses, although I have not fully counted on it, says Bjørkevoll. In the local grocery store in Fresvik, Posten has a delivery city. But today PostNord does not deliver parcels ordered online, there. See the full response to PostNord further down in the case. – Reason not to move to the village At the local grocery store, news meets several people who are frustrated. – Terribly cumbersome, compared to me who lives in Oslo and can pick up parcels 250 meters from where I live, says expatriate Vilde Riiser Bøtun. She believes that the parcel problem, in the worst case, prevents people from moving to the village. – I think that there is actually a reason why you can’t move here. Riiser Bøtun says she constantly sees people asking for help to pick up parcels in Balestrand on the local Facebook group. Photo: Oda Flaten Lødemel / news On a local Facebook group, people often ask if someone is passing by Balestrand and can take a package back with them. It has almost become something they joke about, says Riiser Bøtun. Pensioner Marie Hauglum Ekeberg has experienced several times that parcels have ended up in Balestrand. – It is tiring. For older people, this is so cumbersome that we stop shopping. Simply. She says she can almost understand that people do not want to move to the village if it is going to be so difficult to get parcels sent. Ekeberg wants them to be able to choose who the parcels will be sent with. Hauglum Ekeberg has not taken up the problem with PostNord himself, but hopes that there will be a solution to the parcel problem straight away. Photo: Oda Flaten Lødemel / news Ferry departures are not taken care of – but promises improvement news has asked PostNord why they do not deliver parcels to Fresvik and why the parcels often end up in Balestrand. Haakon Nikolai Olsen, press manager at PostNord Norway, responds as follows in an e-mail on Wednesday 17 July: “The challenge here is that our system does not take into account ferry departures – and the real distance from the recipient’s home address to the relevant pick-up point and its location . Nevertheless, this is a problem we are aware of and are trying to solve. It’s simply an API challenge.” Sogn Avis has received similar answers in the past. – Unfortunately, this is not a “qucikfix”, he elaborates in a new e-mail, but write that they are working on this together with their Swedish colleagues to find a solution. But in a new e-mail on Thursday 18 July, Olsen promises that PostNord “during the early autumn will either open its own collection point or use a subcontractor to improve our offer for the residents of this area.” Bjarne Bjørkevoll looks out over the Sognefjord. On the other side is Leikanger. Even further out into the fjord, so far that we can’t see it in the picture, lies Balestrand. Photo: Oda Flaten Lødemel / news For Bjørkevoll, the solution is clear. – If it had been the case that all the online shops had Posten as a choice, then we would have chosen it. Answer from PostNord In an e-mail, the press manager of PostNord Norway, Haakon Nikolai Olsen, wrote the following: First, some general information about how this with collection points works in practice. In online stores today, there are many different solutions and integrations for offering shipping. Both directly to PostNord or via a third party. Where some have very many choices, others have few or none. Therefore, the recipient can experience different pick-up locations even if it is PostNord that delivers. In order to give the recipient the best experience, we always encourage our customers to offer a pick-up location of their choice in the online store. PostNord currently has a network consisting of 2,900 collection points all over Norway which we are constantly expanding and we are always grateful for feedback on requests for new locations which we take into account in this work. We expect to pass well over 3,000 collection points during the year. As regards this matter of Fresvik / Balestrand specifically, we currently do not have a pick-up point in Fresvik and it is an area for which we already have an ongoing process. During the early autumn, we will either open our own or use a subcontractor to improve our offer for the residents of this area. Published 22.07.2024, at 16.46
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Frustrated residents of Fresvik do not get parcels from PostNord delivered to the village – news Vestland
