I ordered some books from Amazon. Parcel arrived today. Looks like the parcel was ripped opened and haphazardly taped together.

Since it's from Amazon, I assume they were interested in what I'm feeding my brain. Is it common practice to open parcels from overseas, or did I make some watch list? Perhaps one too many posts in the complaints corner.

I'm feeling a bit violated, but it's not the first time around here. Is privacy a concept that was left behind in the last century?

Should the post office accept that since the box says Amazon, there's nothing dangerous or illegal inside?

There's also another explanaiton for this one, it happened to me.

The cardboard of an order from weltbild.ch was too weak to hold everything together and when it got wet it tore open.Some person somewhere within the Post system then taped my parcel back together and they added a small pre-printed notice about what happened.

Could well be what happened with your delivery too,dontcha think

My parcels are often opened by the Customs to check the contents, as far as I am concerned they are just doing there job. Yes it's annoying and could be construed as an invasion of privacy but they have to check the contents are legal.

When I was living in England I had a parcel from Amazon arrive that looked like it had ripped, although it wasn't taped. In that instance it seemed to be partly dodgy packaging and partly the postal process. Amazon replaced the book as it was bent.

Just out of interest, my order was "Where's My Teddy?", for my two year old daughter. I hope yours provided better reading material if someone did have a look!

Doing forensics on the package, I see there was an attempt to open the package by pulling the tab. Except the paper tear veered to one side. Then it looks like it was grabbed from the edge of the tear, and forced open.

Couldn't they have just looked at the bill to see which book was in it? Mind you, I bought a book with a very provocative title. Perhaps they wanted to read it for themselves?

The title of the book is VERY embarassing, but it was just for irony. The book itself is goodness to the core.

You have to tell us now...

What was the book called?

I was a postie in England for a while, and quite often packages get torn and have to be repaired because some of the sorting machines they have to pass through are so old they just continually jam up. Also a lot of people in the sorting offices treat the goods you've paid for like dirt and throw them all over the place. Good to know hey....

But that would be a digression of the thread.

No it wouldn't. It would provide the last peice to the puzzle as to why you feel so violated.

It is Friday afternoon after all, the perfect time to divulge

As moderator of this Forum I hereby give you explicit permission to divulge the title of the book .

Alright, for your entertainment. But please no comments about it beyond this point. It's called "Sex God" by Rob Bell. Before passing judgement, you are required to read it. Perhaps the title was too much to bear for the people at the Post.

Hmmm. Perhaps "Where's my Teddy?" might not have elicited the same response after all

It certainly seems it wasn't left in the same century as paranoia.

Maybe it was one of those "Danish" packages of magazines that are always shipped in brown unmarked packaging

dave

Cute. But I've never heard of those. Tell me more.

The question was about parcels and privacy. Should privacy not be expected?

Not when you are sending packages across borders. Customs reserve the right to check the consignment is in accordance with applicable import regulations. Is that better ?

dave

It definitely should, similar as even-mindedness about the conspiracy of every Swiss citizen to actually invade yours.

Yeah, that is better. Thanks.