By Mary Jane Boland
The phrase "the cheque is in the mail" has taken on new meaning for an Auckland businessman after New Zealand Post lost his mail containing cheques worth about $500,000.
Workers at Eastern and Global Flower Exporters at Auckland Air-port posted around 300 cheques on December 18 but 120
never arrived.
The firm's managing director, Greg Keymer, said it was ridiculous that NZ Post had no idea where the mail could be and did not have a tracking system for letters.
He said NZ Post should have barcodes on all of its mailbags to prevent such a problem and wondered how many other firms had had similar losses.
Mr Keymer said he could under-stand one or two letters disappear-ing but was concerned at how many of his growers had not received pay-ments. The cheques, which have been stopped, were for payments ranging from about $500 to several thousand dollars.
NZ Post has said it will pay for stopping the cheques, a charge of about $15 each.
A spokeswoman said the firm's security investigator was investigat-ing. It was highly unusual for such a large amount of mail to go missing.
