I placed two orders via Amazon, and one of those orders required a OTP. The delivery driver arrived, asked for the code and I stupidly gave it to him. He handed me over a box that had clearly been tampered with so I quickly opened the box before he arrived to find the expensive item missing.
I ran after the driver and he told me he would check the back of his van for it, though he wouldn’t know what he was looking for considering I didn’t tell him what was missing…
He gruntled and said “you need to contact Amazon”. I managed to get his van registration as well as some sneaky photos of his face, although they are not the best images.
I contacted Amazon, they said there’s nothing they can do I would need to contact the police for a crime number. I contacted the police, they said they can’t give me a crime number because I’m not a victim, Amazon is. Amazon won’t help me further, the police won’t help me further. I am £679 down and that shameless man is up an iPad that was a gift for my son.
Is there anything else I can do? This can’t be it surely…
If Amazon say it’s your fault because you handed over the code, then I would imagine that they would fight a chargeback too on the same basis.
But I would try again with Amazon. Have a look on LinkedIn/Google for their more senior complaints teams, not just someone reading from a script in call centre, someone who will actually listen and understand what happened.
I would keep complaining to Amazon. As the sender, they are responsible for the delivery, is my understanding.
How did you pay? If you paid with a credit card you could file a section 75 claim for non delivery. Or if with a Monzo card, you could ask for a chargeback.
Amazon may contest these, and they may also blacklist you as a customer, so I would continue trying to contact Amazon support. At the very least you can tell them that the police wing give you a crime number, and ask again for them to refund or redeliver the item.
The police you spoke to are incorrect. They can, and should, give you a crime reference number.
Amazon frequently call us to verify crime reference numbers.
I’m not sure what area you find yourself in, but many forces allow online reporting which should give you a crime reference number at the end without having to speak to someone.
At the absolute worst give them your call reference number. Either they won’t verify it, or if they do then the operator will see what has been advised.
This should only direct you to your local force once you input the address. That should then tell you if you can report online.
There’s no harm playing around with that form, it doesn’t submit anything.
In terms of advice, I can only assume the operator was trying to be realistic - it’ll be Amazon ultimately to resolve this as this type of theft is near impossible to investigate, so you’re usually quicker just going to the retailer and getting a refund. They should still record this though as an allegation of a crime has been made.
It’s shocking that these unscrupulous drivers are becoming more common here in the UK too.
I suppose when you drive your employees off their feet (no pun intended) and force them to go to toilet in plastic bottles, you struggle to recruit and retain even barely acceptable staff. Rampant, unchecked capitalism is to blame here ultimately.
Just to say, don’t beat yourself up over giving out the code – I don’t think they would’ve handed you the box/let you check the contents before you’ve done so as it’s to verify you are indeed the recipient. I doubt that would have any bearing on your ability to claim for failure to deliver your item.
Otherwise follow what others said above and contact the police/Amazon again and if all else fails, do a chargeback or S75 claim
Luckily this has never happened to me, but with Apple products, sometimes the serial number will be shown in your order history once dispatched. I don’t know if that will be something useful to give to the Police when you get your crime reference number.
Dependent on the van it’ll have cameras, although I think they only cover the cab and not the back of the van inside it. Amazon could in theory check those just to see if anything happened in the cab, but note it’s AI powered so will only record when it thinks it needs to.
Good luck getting your refund, hopefully you’ll get it. Just might take a while of pushing them from the sounds of it.
My local police is Nottinghamshire Police. I contacted them via 101 on Saturday, and was given an incident number. Spoke to an officer on Sunday who said he couldn’t give me a crime reference number. I then rang on Monday and was told by a different officer, I wouldn’t be given a crime reference number as I’m not a victim.
I used my Monzo debit card. I’ve asked Amazon if the item had a serial number etc and nothing is on file.
I’ve spoken to Citizen’s Advice who have given me great advice, I just need to somehow source a more senior complaints teams
Seems to be a running thing with police forces saying anything to avoid giving a crime ref number to keep their stats down.
Civilian call handlers being judge jury and executioner is not okay, but at least the gov can bring them in as barristers when there’s a strike.
The problem with Amazon they have a massive amount of fraud and get aggressive with unfair and sometimes illegal internal policies, but as said above be aware they often close accounts of people who take it further, and ban the address and cards so if you link to a new account that gets closed as well.
The police told OP it was because they were not the victim of the crime. I’m probably talking out of my arse, but could it be that the police view the crime as someone stole the iPad from Amazon, and Amazon are the victim because, until it should have been delivered to OP, the iPad was Amazon’s property? Is that how property works during a sale? No idea.
As far as the police could be concerned, OP is just someone that needs to get a refund from Amazon and that’s not a police matter.
That’ll be what the operator was thinking I’d probably guess but this crime reference thing isn’t anything to do with statistics.
A crime reference number in no way acknowledges that a crime has taken place. It simply acknowledges a crime has been alleged and reported. Very different.
Civilian staff taking reports isn’t them being “judge and jury” at all.
Famously a group reported that Covid lockdowns were causing deaths and therefore were a crime. They were given a crime reference number and went around telling people that this was the police acknowledging a crime. Not at all.
Amazon, or any insurance company for example, contact the police to see the content of the crime report. It can easily be closed as a non-crime or civil law matter and this is how they gather what has happened.
It’s not really the opening situation for a crime report, it’s the closing situation that’s important.
TLDR; they definitely can give you a crime reference number. However I’d go along with the incident number and give that to Amazon. Once they refund you it’s on them to look into it.
