RESIDENTS are fuming because they have not received their post for almost two weeks.

Sonya Wheldon, 42, of Markwick Mews, Worthing, has been waiting for an important letter from the hospital to confirm a blood test appointment.

She first contacted Royal Mail last Friday to check the whereabouts of her letter.

However, she was only given a complaint form to fill in.

She said: “I’ve been waiting for a blood test form which is very important to me as my health hasn’t been good.

“In the past, I would receive letters from my GP a day after my appointment. That’ s why I contacted Royal Mail.

“When I contacted them last Friday, I was already waiting for a week.

“I think Royal Mail has been experiencing problems since they were privatised.

“It seems to be an issue in our area.

“I really don’t understand because Markwick Mews is close to the town centre.

“What if someone is waiting for things like a passport or other important documents?”

Neighbour Valerie Watson, 65, said: “I’ve been waiting for my post and parcels since last Monday.

“I received my hospital appointment letter yesterday and one of my daughter’s parcel, but I shouldn’t need to wait that long.

“When I was waiting for my post I complained to Royal Mail who told me they were understaffed.

“Someone from the Royal Mail office came to deliver our post. He told me he doesn’t deliver post but was asked to do it.

“We have 15 houses here and we have delivery problems. However, the private estate at the back always get theirs.

“It seems our little street has the delays.”

Royal Mail spokeswoman said: 

"We have been experiencing some periods of higher than average sick absence in our Worthing delivery office recently, which has resulted in some intermittent disruption to our services. 

"While we have been doing all we can to maintain delivery services to all customers, we apologise to  those customers who have been affected. We have some new staff joining us and we are confident that we will be able to restore a high quality of service to all our customers very soon.

"We do have staff who generally work in the office supporting our delivery postmen and women. They are trained to do deliveries and we use them on some occasions to cover for our regular postmen and women.

"If they are on leave or off sick, as in the case you refer to. This isn’t unusual and we have done this in Worthing on some days recently to help maintain deliveries to customers. 

"Any customers who have concerns about particular items of mail should contact Royal Mail Customer Services via our website: www.royalmail.com, on Twitter @RoyalMailHelp or by phone on 03457 740 740 so we can investigate."