SMASHING FOOTAGE
Shocking moment Hermes courier hurls grandad’s fragile handmade ornaments into a van before they are sent off to customers
Horrified Tim Stephens said he could hear smashing sounds as his parcels were dispatched to customers
A GRANDAD who sells handmade garden ornaments watched in horror as a Hermes courier hurled his fragile packages into a van.
Tim Stephens said there were "smashing" sounds as the driver collected a bag of parcels on their way to customers and lobbed each one in the back of a white Transit.
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The driver - who was working for third party firm CitySprint on behalf of Hermes - was filmed by Tim making his collection in Street, Somerset.
Packages are clearly marked with red and white "Fragile" tape, but the courier merrily tosses them one by one on top of a huge pile of other parcels.
Some are thrown with such force they bounce off the inside of the roof.
Tim said: "Excuse my language, but he just didn't seem to be giving a sh*t."
Tim, 54, said when he first parked behind the van he saw the driver chucking another load of parcels in the back.
He said: "We couldn't believe it, he was just chucking it all in. My wife was saying you can hear smashing. You could actually hear it."
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He then dropped off his own packages at a shop to be couriered - and the same driver came in to collect them.
He filmed what happened next as he and his wife Carol, 50, and daughter Sophie, 22, sat in their car behind.
Tim said: "We thought perhaps it was just a one off. But then he did it again, they were our parcels in that bag.
"You probably hear my laughing in the video, but not because I find it funny, it's because it's unbelievable.
"That whole bag is full of our parcels and some other people's things.
"It's awful to see the parcels being treated that way. It's disheartening."
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Tim, who works nights in a courier service warehouse, makes his hand-crafted stone ornaments by day and uses Hermes to send them around the country.
He dreams of doing it full time as a business, but said he recently spent a whole week sorting out customer refunds for items that arrived broken.
He said: "We make the ornaments from scratch. It takes four days before they go out to customers.
"Seeing him doing that to the parcels makes me think, is there any point in me carrying on? It's very disheartening."
CitySprint said: "We treat any item placed into our hands with great care and take any reports of mishandling very seriously.
"We have conducted a full investigation into the report of an incident in Somerset and will no longer be contracting with the courier involved.
"We will take any steps necessary to ensure our high standards are maintained.";
A Hermes spokesperson said: "We can confirm the driver in the video was working on behalf of a third-party supplier and that they have taken the necessary action to ensure this does not happen again."
In April a Hermes driver was filmed shot-putting a parcel 65ft over a garden gate in Great Holm, Bucks.
Last December another Hermes courier was videoed forcefully chucking fragile packages into the back of a van in Reading, Berks.
The month before a CitySprint driver was caught throwing parcels like frisbees in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire.
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