This is the shocking moment an Evri delivery driver carelessly throws packages out of his van into a gutter in front of a disgruntled customer.
The courier in Torquay, Devon, dumped the parcels, which are of various sizes, in front of photographer Maciej Olszewski, who feared one of the items could be his new camera.
Footage has now emerged of the incident, which took place on April 18, showing the driver’s white delivery van parked on the side of the road.
A growing pile of packages is scattered along the ditch beneath the pavement, just a couple of meters from a drain.
With the van’s tailgate open, a brown cardboard box can be seen being tossed from inside the vehicle into the ditch before a softer bright blue package joins it on the side of the road.
This is the shocking moment an Evri delivery driver carelessly throws packages out of his van into a gutter in front of a disgruntled customer.
A large cardboard package can be seen being thrown from the white van into a growing pile of packages dumped in the gutter.
Items of various sizes are found on the side of the road in Torquay, Devon, just a couple of meters from a drain.
As the camera zooms in on the large pile of items that need to be delivered, another pair of soft packages fly out of the van.
Finally, a large, heavy-looking cardboard box is thrown from the vehicle and lands on top of several other packages.
The shocking scene takes place in broad daylight, as cars speed by on the busy highway.
Evri said Sun that the driver responsible for dropping the packages has received a “training course” but remains an employee of the company.
The company added that they take “seriously” their responsibility to “take care” of each package.
Olszewski, who was on his way to work when he witnessed the incident, said he had received damaged packages before.
“I thought, ‘What the hell could this be my new camera?'” he said.
“Someone could have just as easily stolen them.”
Evri told The Sun that the driver responsible for dumping the packages has received a “training course” but remains an employee of the company.
Maciej Olszewski, who was on his way to work when he witnessed the incident, said he had received damaged packages before.
In December, the Mail went undercover against the courier company after it was branded Britain’s “worst” courier company.
We found a workforce, assembled after minimal training, struggling to earn minimum wage in any weather, as evidenced by those soggy packages.
Desperate to find drivers in the run-up to Christmas, and in the midst of what was billed as the “biggest recruitment drive in our history”, Evri offered our reporter a job just hours after completing an online application.
After receiving just three hours of in-person training, he was immediately sent on the road with a carload of 30 packages.
While Evri claims drivers “have the opportunity to earn a competitive rate of £10 to £15 per hour”, he found that to hit those figures he needed to deliver a parcel at a rate of one every two minutes – a high amount. order.
This meant that during the four days he spent picking, loading and delivering from a warehouse in the Midlands, on no day did his basic wage reach the minimum wage of £10.42 an hour.
Evri, meanwhile, insists that ‘new starters’ like our reporter would earn more than that figure because they receive bonuses during the first few days to compensate for their lack of experience.
It should be noted that minimum wage laws do not apply to self-employed couriers.
His total salary over the four days was £107.25, including £3.44 for collecting a handful of parcels for subsequent delivery by Evri.
For the 187 packages he delivered he received, on average, 55 pence per item. The rounds covered approximately 50 miles, using £8 worth of petrol, not including the journey back to the depot from home each day.
When approached by the Mail, a spokesperson for Evri said: “All couriers earn above the national minimum wage with an average wage of more than £15 an hour, with many earning much more at this busy time of year.”
‘New employees receive training and supplementary pay because they will not be as fast as more established couriers.
‘The couriers are highly organized, have great time management and live in their local community, meaning they know the area and the routes, which has earned them over 3 million five-star reviews on Trustpilot. Some people find that the job is not for them because of the need to have these skills and qualities.
‘The name change to Evri was a result of the sale of the UK business by Hermes to Advent, not for reputational reasons as you claim. Since the company was no longer part of the Hermes group, it could not retain that name.
Evri questioned the accuracy of the journalist’s findings, saying his data shows couriers scan and load an average of 124 parcels in 30 minutes and that previous couriers on the same rounds earned around £18 an hour.
A scene from an Evri undercover video in Burntwood, Staffordshire
We went undercover to see first-hand what is happening in a company responsible for delivering 700 million packages a year (File photo)
His data showed that he also moved slowly between delivery points. New members receive an additional payment of £120 as they gain experience.
The Mail understands that couriers are supposed to sort parcels “from cage to cage” rather than leaving them on the ground. As for cars overloaded with packages, couriers receive training on how to safely sort them and can make two runs, with additional compensation.
The tight margins and, for some, the flexibility of the work outweigh the hard work and hidden costs involved.
