My Christmas is ruined after DPD delivered my gifts… and I got a very grim surprise instead | The Sun

A MUM says her Christmas has been ruined after DPD delivered her gifts, but she got a very grim surprise instead.

Julia Harris' festive season is already not what she hoped as, after a year of ill health, her family decided to spend it apart.

So when she opened what was meant to be a box full of individually wrapped gifts and found "rusty old car parts" she was devastated.

The Bristol woman says there were signs something was wrong her parcel, which was sent using DPD, when it arrived this week and the large box was a different shape.

The parcel was also wrapped in "re-sealed by DPD with care" tape and, along with having the pieces of metal inside, it was packed with Amazon cardboard and bubble wrap.

Julia knew what it was meant to look like as her son and his father Adrian had shown her it via video chat.

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While the mum still doesn't know what was inside – in the hope it shows up and she can get a surprise on Christmas day – the family day collectively the presents were worth about £200.

They were said to be chosen with great care, and some were even handmade.

Julia said: “I rang my son and his dad straight away. They thought I was joking and winding them up, so I showed them on a video call, and they couldn’t believe it.

"My son’s dad got straight onto DPD, who were absolutely useless and didn’t want to know.”

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She continued: “They don’t care, we’re just another customer to them, just another barcode.

"The little Christmas we were going to have we haven’t got now, it’s been ruined."

DPD has now said it's "very sorry" and had "launched a full investigation".

After suffering three heart attacks this year, the mum and her family decided it was best for her health if they didn't gather together.

That was when they came up with the plan that she could open all the individual presents while chatting via video on Christmas Day.

After doing some research, Julia said the parcel's tracking information suggested it was repacked at a DPD depot in Cardiff, but the tracking "looked normal" until then.

She said it was then repacked and re-labelled at 9am on the day of delivery.

The mum said she tried phoning the depot throughout the day on Tuesday but said was unable to get any response.

At the same time Adrian had contacted DPD and was initially told that because it was a DPD Local delivery, he would need to contact Parcel2Go, who works with the company.

He said he persisted in trying to speak to someone at DPD and was asked for video evidence to be sent to an email address, but he claimed that the address wasn’t valid and kept bouncing back.

Adrian says he then waited in a phone queue for more than an hour before being given another address to send the footage to.

The family say the only reply they have received was a generic response that said the company would look into it in due course.

But Julia says that in due course would not mean she would get her presents for Christmas Day.

While they understand it's a highly stressful time of the year for DPD, the family say the company's lack of willingness to engage in communication is inexcusable.

They have now said they won't be using DPD again.

A spokesperson for DPD said: "We are very sorry indeed to hear about this and have launched a full investigation.

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"From our security images, we can see that the packaging failed in transit, and we are now conducting a search to locate the missing items, as a matter of urgency.

"We will be in contact with the customer to resolve this issue."

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