Royal Mail cuts may end Saturday post
The proposal to reduce deliveries to five days a week will also see fewer first class letters arrive the day after they are sent.
The recommendations, to be submitted in the next 10 days as part of a review into the future of the postal sector, are included in a radical plan by the regulator Postcomm to shore up finances at the Royal Mail.
It hopes to secure the future of the "universal service", which means the company promises to deliver letters to each of the 28 million add-resses in Britain for the same price.
Moving from a six-days-a-week delivery would mark a further reduction of services by Royal Mail, which has already been allowed to end twice-daily deliveries in an effort to restore profitability.
The average delivery time has slipped and post boxes are no longer emptied on a Sunday. Any attempt to drop the Saturday delivery would be fiercely opposed, not least because it is enshrined in law under the Postal Services Act of 2000. Politicians, consumer groups, businesses and the unions say Postcomm's proposals would lead to a further diminution of the service.
It is the first time that the Royal Mail has ever made a loss from this service.
It prompted Adam Crozier, the chief executive, to issue a warning, saying that radical changes were needed to save the service which he called a "bedrock" of society.
John Hutton the Business Secretary, launched an independent review into the future of the postal sector late last year. Its main task is to investigate whether the Royal Mail can continue in its current form.
In a provisional report released earlier this week the review panel has already said "the status quo is not tenable".
All the interested parties have to submit their final suggestions to the review, chaired by Richard Hooper, the former deputy chairman of Ofcom, by the end of next week.
Postcomm's recommendations about cutting the six-day service are included in its submission to the review, the Telegraph understands.
The regulator also suggests that the Royal Mail's delivery targets should be lowered.
Currently 93 per cent of first class mail has to be delivered the next day, a target the Royal Mail has hit in the past two years. But Postcomm questions whether it needs to be so high.
The proposals are likely to be taken seriously by the review panel. In the past, significant recommendations have been implemented.
Elderly people would be among the hardest hit by the lowering of service, a spokesman for Help the Aged said last night. Mervyn Kohler, the head of public affairs at the charity, said: "This would severely impact pensioners, many of whom rely on the postal service as their only form of communication."
Charles Hendry, the shadow spokesman on postal affairs, said: "This will undoubtedly result in a poorer service for customers at a time when many of them face losing their local post office altogether."
Most of the mail delivered across Britain is sent by companies.
David Frost, chairman of the British Chambers of Commerce, said: " In an age when businesses need to communicate more and more, we can't allow any further fall in service.
Royal Mail said it would strongly oppose any move to trim the universal service.
A spokesman said: "Royal Mail is dismayed that Postcomm is considering adverse changes including cutting deliveries on a Saturday and reducing our first class quality of service targets."
A spokesman from Postcomm said: “There is no truth in this suggestion that Postcomm will recommend a cut in services. The current system is enshrined in law.”
