A Northumberland woman has said she is "at a loss" after not receiving letters delivered to her address from Royal Mail for eight months. Claire Taylor, 56, from Pegswood, has missed important post since January 2026, including bank and monthly DWP statements, and letters from the NHS about hospital appointments, and says the situation has caused her major distress.
Woman's ordeal with missing post
Speaking to ChronicleLive, Claire said: "A few months ago I realised that I was not getting as much mail as normal. There was things I’d normally get monthly that just stopped coming.
"I rang the DWP and said why wasn't my statement coming? And they said we've posted it out to you every month five days before your monthly payment goes into your bank and they confirmed they had the right address, but none of those statements for the last eight months have come to my door."
Things further intensified when Claire received an email from the NHS asking why she hadn’t turned up for an appointment at hospital. She continued: "I rang and spoke to somebody and I had missed two hospital appointments, but I hadn't received the actual appointment letter. So they had gone awry as well."
Investigation and response
The single mother of one, whose 17-year-old son is still receiving mail to the same address, says she kept an eye on the situation and checked with neighbours. Claire said: "I found it really strange. I asked a couple of months ago on the Pegswood Matters Facebook page if anybody has any problems and nobody has. Some may have been delayed a couple of days but nobody's had months and months of no post."
Claire complained to the Post Office in June and received a response from the Post Review Panel and Customer Operations Manager for her local sorting office in Morpeth, who acknowledged there has been significant disruption to deliveries in the area but stated no mail has been withheld. She was later told her complaint has been fully reviewed, however is yet to receive her missing mail.
"In the meantime, I had contacted my local MP and got the police involved because it's mail fraud, it's a criminal offence," Claire said. "So they started doing an investigation and spoke to both the Royal Mail and the Sorting Office at Morpeth and got the same answer... they can't see why I'm not getting my mail. Case closed. But I’m still eight months down the line not getting my mail."
Fears of identity fraud and impact on health
Claire says she believes she "could be targeted" or "someone could be purposely withholding" her mail and is now fearful her personal information could have been taken from her missing letters. "They could commit identity fraud. So I'm just sitting here waiting for something like that to hit," she said.
"It's not only affected my physical health because I've missed those appointments, it's actually affected my mental health because I can't stop thinking about it."
While Claire has been able to transfer her NHS correspondence to emails, she says the DWP can only be sent via post. "Not one of them letters in the last eight months has gotten to my door, but they were getting to my door perfectly fine prior to that. It’s really bizarre."
"They're [Royal Mail] taking no accountability whatsoever. They're trying to say maybe it's being posted using a different kind of postal system. But the DWP and NHS use Royal Mail. They haven't taken accountability for the fact that eight months worth of one person's mail has gone missing."
Claire adds that the thought someone could know her details is worrying. "It's really frustrating, it's annoying. I'm a single disabled mum on my own and anyone could show up at my house - that’s the worry. The longer it goes on it’s nerve wracking, knowing it's me, it’s definitely not the address, because my son's getting his mail. The Royal mail checked and did say there's no redirection on my address."
"I’ll probably never find out where it’s all gone…. How many other people is this happening to?," Claire added.
A Royal Mail spokesperson said: "We take the security of our customers’ mail extremely seriously and understand the concern this situation has caused.
"The Postal Review Panel has reviewed Ms Taylor’s complaint and, as part of this, asked the local delivery office to carry out additional monitoring of deliveries to her address. The local office confirmed that no mail had been withheld, and the monitoring confirmed that mail was being delivered to her address.
"There have been some local delivery issues in the area due to staffing pressures, and we apologise for any disruption customers have experienced."
