Thanks very much for the responses. I'm very grateful.
My main issue is that the item was obviously never theirs. They were paid to safely, professionally & competently deliver the item from A to B; a service they claim they are in business to do. (although my personal experience with Hermes is that that fail to do any of this more often than not)
The fact that they took it upon themselves to discard my item because they broke it was never theirs to make.
I have been through SCC before for something else so understand to some degree how it works.
I'm more than prepared to do it and your advice in particualr, BankFodder, is what I was looking for.
Thanks again for all of your input. I'll keep you posted.