An Evri courier has been slammed by furious customers after footage emerged online of a driver appearing to haphazardly throw a collection of parcels into a gutter.
The video, posted by Maciej Olszewski, shows a dented white van parked up on double yellow lines in Torquay, Devon, as a courier inside flings a series of parcels from a height onto the road below.
As the packages pile up and cars drive past, the delivery driver continues to jettison his load onto the tarmac - before finally lobbing one large cardboard parcel onto the others.
Olszewski had been on his way to work when he saw the apparent carelessness unfolding - and it immediately sparked worries that a new camera he'd ordered may have ended up on the roadside.
The driver could be seen lobbing the packages out of the back of his dented van - without taking a single look outside
Facebook/Maciej Olszewski
Olszewski, 49, told the Sun: "I thought: 'what the f***, could this be my new camera?' Many times, I [have] received damaged parcels... Someone could have stolen them just as easily."
Though Olszewski didn't confront the driver - who, in the video, does not look out of the van - he joked: "This is what [Evri's] internal procedures look like."
Commenters on social media voiced their outrage over the video, with some pointing out the dents in the van and others claiming they'd had similar experiences.
Despite the courier firm telling the Sun they took their responsibility to "care" for their parcels "seriously", the driver in question is still working for Evri.
MORE DELIVERY DISAPPOINTMENT:
The shocking footage was taken in Torquay, Devon
Getty
The company did not explain why their driver had been throwing the parcels into the gutter below - but told GB News: "We take our responsibility to care for every parcel seriously and the footage shown does not reflect our high standards.
"Action has been taken quickly to ensure this doesn't happen again, including additional training."
Evri couriers are trained to safely sort parcels "from cage to cage" rather than laying them on the ground.
A spokesperson from the firm told the Daily Mail: "All couriers earn above the national minimum wage with pay averaging over £15 an hour, with many earning much more at this busy time of the year.
"New starters receive training and top-up payments because they will not be as quick as more established couriers."
The video captured just one of a spate of delivery woes plaguing UK customers; couriers from other firms have been caught out leaving packages in wheelie bins on rubbish collection days, while another saw a gift for his partner deposited in a compost bin.
The latter customer told Newsweek his package had been left amongst "a combination of rotting sausages and a cocktail of seven years' worth of meal scraps that had turned into slime".
While other Britons have lamented doorstep thefts - some by drivers themselves.
A report on global parcel theft by hardware company Penn Elcom suggested that over 8million packages had been lost or stolen in the UK from May 2021 to April 2022, while missing parcels claims shot up by 59 per cent by last June, according to figures from tech firm Metapack.