Author: Archive

FT Editorial on Leighton vs Postcomm

Posted by | Dec 5, 2002 | |

ROYAL MAIL PACKAGE LOST IN THE POST: POSTCOMM MUST FOCUS ON CREATING A COMPETITIVE MARKET
Allan Leighton’s appointment as chairman of Royal Mail Group was an act of genius. The former Asda boss has driven through cost cuts to lift this once highly profitable monopoly out of the red. He has begun to put it on a firmer footing to face competition as the market is opened up over the next three years. And he is ambitious enough to plan returning the post office network to profit by turning it into “the EasyJet of banking”. All this while the foremost advocate of “going plural” continues to hold a fistful of other top jobs.

There is a downside in all this, however. Running Royal Mail during these most testing of times would be no easy matter full-time. Less than full-time, quick judgments must be made – and there is a premium on short, sharp campaigns against threats to the business plan. In most cases it is Postcomm, the regulator, that is the scapegoat – most recently over its proposals for price controls.

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Price of stamp could rise 17%

Posted by | Dec 5, 2002 | |

Royal Mail, the troubled postal services group, yesterday gave warning that the price of stamps could rise by up to 17 per cent if a campaign to end its VAT-exempt status on business services is successful.

Charging VAT on Royal Mail’s business services would be another blow to Allan Leighton, chairman of Royal Mail, who is struggling to reduce the organisation’s huge losses.

A spokesman said: “The last thing we want is to put up our [business service] prices by 17 per cent. That would affect everything from business services to the price of stamps because we can’t differentiate between many services we handle.”

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PallEx has furious split with veteran member

Posted by | Dec 4, 2002 | |

A furious row has broken out between pallet network Pall-Ex and one of its longest-serving members, Rymer Transport.

The Croydon-based firm is incensed that it was kicked out of the network at very short notice; and it claims that the hub held onto its freight for almost 24 hours.

Rymer boss Darren Jenkins says that although his firm had tendered its resignation to the network, it was working through its notice period. The first sign of problems with its membership came when its trunker arrived at the Pall-Ex hub on Tuesday night (19 November). After it was unloaded the Rymer driver was told that his firm’s contract had been terminated and he was asked to leave.

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Postal plan to take off as the 'Easyjet of banking'

Posted by | Dec 4, 2002 | |

Post Office Ltd, the Achilles’ heel of Royal Mail Group, could become the “EasyJet of banking” within a few years, according to Allan Leighton.

The chairman of Royal Mail said its subsidiary, which last half-year ran up losses of GBP95m before exceptionals, could one day return to profitability by providing cheap and simple banking services to millions.

“With 3m to 5m card accounts we could break even,” Mr Leighton said. “If you then add on banking services, we can make it very profitable and become the EasyJet of banking.”

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TNT chief may win top Royal Mail job

Posted by | Dec 4, 2002 | |

The managing director of TNT, the express delivery company, has emerged as a surprise front-runner to take over as Royal Mail chief executive.

Alan Jones joins Adam Crozier, former chief executive of the Football Association, on a shortlist of two for the job.

The Royal Mail is struggling to control heavy losses and plans 30,000 redundancies among its 200,000 staff. Allan Leighton, who changed the name back from Consignia, was appointed chairman in January but has insisted on remaining part-time to cope with nine other directorships.

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Post Denmark slims

Posted by | Dec 4, 2002 | |

The Danish post office, Post Danmark, is aiming to slash its bureaucracy and become more customer focused by simplifying its oeprations into 8 business units.

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Australian Regulation scrapped

Posted by | Dec 4, 2002 | |

The Australian government is set to deregulate some of its postal services but has admitted some of the work is already being carried out illegally by private contractors.

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Postal entity to have net worth of 6-7Tril Yen

Posted by | Dec 4, 2002 | |

The government has drafted a decree calling for net worth equivalent to 6-7 trillion yen to be held by a public corporation to be set up in April to take over postal services from the Postal Services Agency, government officials said Wednesday.

The draft was approved by the governing Liberal Democratic Party’s policy-making panel on postal services earlier in the day and is expected to be adopted by the cabinet Dec. 13, said officials at the Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications.

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