Same here in germany. If the neighbor accepts the package, the parcel service notes his/her name on the receipt, so the responsibility has been handed to the neighbor.
If the neighbor "looses" the package, the loss can be enforced against him.
One alternative is to allow the parcel service to put the parcel in a safe space (e.g. throw it over the fence ;). Only if you allow the parcel service to do that, they will do it, because only then they are not responsibly for what happens to the package once they've put it in the "safe space".
The best invention in parcel servicing over the last few years are so called Packstationen (package stations), big cupboards with large lockable compartments. The parcel service places the packages there, sends you a text with a mobile TAN, you get the package from there whenever you have time (within the next 2 weeks or so, then it's being sent back). They are placed all over larger towns.
I believe everyone has their "department they don't like" and where you ask yourself: what do they do all day?
For me, it's Governance. The governance departments of big companies do not produce a product the company sells (maybe it can be argued that they take a role in producing the image of the company, though). If they don't do their job properly and other departments of the company do not comply with whatever they are governing, they can always blame that department. And their jobs are well paid as their role is seen as important from a higher management position.
Several people have made use of a lightweight webserver like Lighttpd in combination with PHP/SQLite in order to set up boards or wordpress installations on Raspberry Pis. Would that be something for you?
You are right. From my POV their problem is that you cannot use them for international projects (non US customers cannot use ACH; non us businesses cannot get their money out of Dwolla)
The foundation of the web is open source.