UK Royal Mail demands road toll concessions

Mail chiefs have admitted they could be forced to pass on higher delivery costs to business customers in the Capital unless they can win an exemption from the city’s planned road tolls.

Royal Mail have told city chiefs it will be among the worst hit by the introduction of road tolls, and claims it could add at least GBP 150,000 to the cost of its business delivery operation every year.

The group has asked that its delivery vans be exempt from the GBP 2 toll crossing both the inner and outer cordons proposed in the Capital.

It says that if no exemption is granted it will do everything in its power to avoid passing increased higher costs on to businesses but warns it may be forced to do so.

Ian McKay, Royal Mail group director of Scottish Affairs, said: “We’re asking that Royal Mail vehicles are exempt from the congestion charge so that a substantial cost isn’t added to a public service on a scale not likely to be encountered by any other business or organisation.”

He said businesses in the city centre depended on a delivery first thing in the morning and a collection at the end of the working day.

Mr McKay added that Royal Mail had already managed to slash the number of vehicles used to deliver mail in Edinburgh by 20 per cent. But vans were necessary to deliver huge volumes of mail to businesses and organisations such as Edinburgh City Council, the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Executive, he said.

Around 89 delivery vehicles operate inside the proposed outer cordon with another 45 inside the inner cordon.

“What we want to make clear is that because of our legal and public service obligations, applying the congestion charge to Royal Mail doesn’t serve the very objective upon which congestion charging is based – deterring people from using vehicles in the charging area during the proposed times.

“For Royal Mail, these are the times when it delivers and collects mail from customers, businesses, postboxes and Post Office branches. These times can’t be changed because Edinburgh forms an important link in the highly time sensitive UK mail network.

“Royal Mail’s special duty to deliver mail to every single address in the UK has long been recognised as requiring special status by Scottish and UK government policy and practice.

“Royal Mail vehicles already have exemptions from certain traffic regulations and it is commonplace to exempt Royal Mail vehicles used for making collections and deliveries of mail, cash or valuables from traffic regulations and parking orders.”

Royal Mail vehicles already have an exemption from the congestion charging scheme in Durham, which was introduced in 2002.

A spokeswoman for Transport Initiatives Edinburgh, the arms-length council-owned company charged with delivering the road tolls, ruled out any exemption for the Royal Mail fleet.

She said: “The Royal Mail’s comments and request for an exemption have been taken on board, along with those of other delivery and haulage companies and organisations.