Just a quick note about FedEx, as I've just had some dealings with them, and although they are an international company their dealings and mode of operation seems suspiciously Russian.

So Language Link sent my Visa application to me, by FedEx from Russia, on Wednesday last week. FedEx should have delivered it by Friday - instead, once it reached England they sat on it for four or five days because my address was 'not known'. It's a new house, and the postcode wasn't in their database, so they just decided to leave my package in the sorting office for a while and hope that it went away. Of course, it didn't, and they eventually tried to deliver it on Tuesday of this week (Christmas Eve). I was in, but slept through the delivery (It was early, and I bet they didn't ring the bell anyway), so they took it away again. Very kindly, they left their calling card on the outside of the door so I didn't even know I'd missed them until eight hours later when someone else came home.

Couldn't deliver on Christmas day, obviously, nor Boxing Day, but I was promised delivery on the Friday after. Come Friday afternoon, the parcel still hasn't come so I phone the regional office. No answer. I phone the head office, and after 20 minutes in a queue get told that the number on the calling card for the regional office is, in fact, just plain wrong. I phone the new number I'm given; they don't know where my parcel is but promise to call me back when they've found it. They call me back a little later: they've found it, and will deliver on Monday. Too late for the Consulate. I moan at them; they promise to deliver by 9 on the Saturday morning (the lady on the phone tells me that in practise that means before 12). It comes at 8.15 that morning and I greet the delivery man, who hadn't even had a chance to ring the bell, in my dressing gown.