Courier Guides

Evri lost my parcel — what are my rights?

Updated June 2026  ·  6 min read

Evri will often tell you their liability is capped at £25. What they won't tell you is that this cap may not hold up — because the Consumer Rights Act 2015 gives you protections that no courier's terms and conditions can override.

The £25 limit: what Evri says vs. what the law says

Evri's standard terms cap their liability for a lost parcel at £25 unless you purchased additional cover at the time of booking. For anything worth more than that, they will point to this limit and consider the matter closed.

But under the Consumer Rights Act 2015, any service — including parcel delivery — must be carried out with reasonable care and skill (Section 49). Critically, a trader cannot legally exclude or restrict their liability for failing to meet this standard (Section 57). That means Evri's £25 cap, applied as a blanket limit regardless of what actually happened to your parcel, may be unenforceable.

The law is clear: if Evri failed to deliver your parcel with reasonable care and skill, you are entitled to a remedy — and their terms cannot take that right away from you. The £25 figure is what Evri wants to pay, not necessarily what they are legally obliged to pay.

Section 72 of the same Act goes further, prohibiting traders from using a "secondary contract" — such as paid-for parcel protection — to replicate protections that consumers already have by law. In other words, Evri cannot sell you insurance to cover a failure they were already obligated not to make.

Who has the right to claim?

Evri's contract is with whoever paid to book the delivery — the sender — not the recipient. If you are waiting on a parcel that never arrived, you will need to go via the retailer or individual who sent it, as they are the party with the direct contractual relationship with Evri.

If you sent the parcel yourself — for example, selling on eBay, Vinted, or Depop — the claim is yours to make directly.

What you need to make a claim

This is where things get deliberately difficult. Evri does not provide a customer email address. There is no direct line to a human being. Their support is routed entirely through an online help centre and an automated chatbot — both of which are designed to resolve your query with a canned response and move you on, not to progress a genuine claim.

Getting past the chatbot to a real person requires persistence. Common tactics include repeatedly selecting options the bot cannot handle, or explicitly typing that you want to escalate to a human agent. Even then, responses can take days and often arrive as templated replies that do not address what you actually asked.

Citizens Advice found that almost half of people who experienced a delivery problem faced further difficulties just trying to get it resolved — slow responses, broken contact systems, and having to contact the company multiple times. Evri is consistently among the worst performers on this measure.

Despite all of this, do everything you can in writing through their official channels. Keep screenshots of every interaction, note the date and time of each contact, and save any reference numbers given. This paper trail is essential if you need to escalate.

How long does Evri have to investigate?

Evri's standard investigation window is 28 days from the date you report the parcel missing. You must also submit your claim within 28 days of the estimated delivery date, so don't wait. After 28 days, they may decline your claim on procedural grounds regardless of the merits.

What if Evri rejects your claim or only offers £25?

If Evri rejects your claim or offers a figure you believe does not reflect your loss, you have several options:

  1. Invoke your Consumer Rights Act protections explicitly. Write to Evri stating that under Section 49 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 they were obligated to carry out the delivery with reasonable care and skill, that they failed to do so, and that their liability cap does not override your statutory rights. Many claims are settled at this point.
  2. Escalate within Evri. Ask for the decision to be formally reviewed and make clear you are prepared to pursue the matter further.
  3. Small claims court. For claims up to £10,000, the small claims track is accessible without a solicitor and is taken seriously by couriers. Filing fees start at £35. Couriers frequently settle before a hearing rather than attend court.

Unlike Royal Mail — which is subject to an independent complaints scheme called POSTRS — Evri has no equivalent. There is no ombudsman, no ADR scheme, and no regulator with the power to fine them. If Evri won't engage, your only formal escalation path is the courts.

What if I sent via a broker?

If the parcel was booked through a platform such as Parcel2Go, Parcel Monkey, or ParcelHero, your contract is with the broker — not Evri. Your Consumer Rights Act protections still apply, but your claim goes to the broker first. The broker then pursues Evri under their own commercial terms.

Am I not protected by Ofcom?

Many people assume Ofcom — the UK's communications regulator — oversees courier companies and can intervene on their behalf. The reality is far more limited.

Ofcom has genuine regulatory teeth over Royal Mail and Parcelforce only, because they carry statutory obligations under the Universal Service Obligation. Ofcom can investigate them, set binding targets, and issue substantial fines when those targets are missed. Royal Mail has been fined £5.6m, then £10.5m, then £21m in three consecutive years for missing delivery standards — and is still missing them.

For private couriers like Evri, Yodel, and DPD, Ofcom's powers are almost entirely toothless. It can publish guidance. It can monitor performance. It can produce league tables showing which companies are failing consumers. What it cannot do is compel compliance or issue a fine. There is no legal requirement for Evri to follow anything Ofcom says, and Ofcom will not investigate or act on individual complaints against private couriers.

Ofcom has never fined a private delivery company. Not once. Years of published data showing Evri and others at the bottom of customer service rankings has produced no regulatory consequence whatsoever.

Citizens Advice has explicitly called on Ofcom to be given fining powers over private couriers. As of 2026, the government has not acted on this. Until it does, consumers dealing with Evri have no regulator to turn to — which makes knowing your legal rights under the Consumer Rights Act all the more important.

The bigger picture

Evri handles hundreds of millions of parcels a year. According to Citizens Advice research published in 2025, a record 15 million people experienced a problem with their latest parcel delivery — the highest rate in five years. Almost half of those who experienced a problem faced further difficulties just trying to resolve it.

The complaints systems are not designed to make resolution easy. Long response times, repeated contact requirements, and blanket rejections citing terms and conditions are commonplace. Knowing your legal rights — and being prepared to assert them — is the difference between giving up and getting paid.

Don't want to deal with this yourself?

Asserting your Consumer Rights Act protections against a courier takes time and persistence. ParcelClaimer handles the entire process on your behalf — from the initial claim to pushing back on low offers and pursuing escalation where necessary. No win, no fee. No sign-up required.

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Sources: MoneySavingExpert — Parcel Protection  ·  House of Commons Library, CBP-10614  ·  Citizens Advice, November 2025