Tag: Europe

Postcomm review of UK Royal Mail break-up

Posted by | Aug 9, 2006 | |

The postal regulator Postcomm will confirm today that it is to consult widely on plans to split Royal Mail in two in a drive to increase competition in the letters market.

The proposal is contained in a strategy document being sent to customer groups, business users, suppliers, other postal operators and Royal Mail itself, canvassing views on how the regulatory system should evolve over the next five to 10 years.

Postcomm will also consult users on Royal Mail’s one-price-goes-anywhere universal service guarantee and whether the scope of the obligation should be narrowed to a smaller range of postal services.

The idea behind separating Royal Mail’s trunk network from its “last mile” delivery network of postmen and women is to make the business more transparent to rival operators.

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Home shopping helps boost items sent through the post

Posted by | Aug 9, 2006 | |

The volume of items sent annually through the post soared by five billion over the past decade, the Royal Mail said today.

Alcohol and food was one of the fastest growing sectors, with deliveries more than quadrupling between 1995 and 2005.

An upturn in home shopping meant clothing and shoe deliveries more than trebled over the 10 year period.

The Royal Mail said its “Life through the Letterbox” study gave a unique insight into Britain’s changing consumer habits.

Its data comes from “mail diaries” kept by 100,000 households over the course of a decade.

The Royal Mail said it delivered 22 billion items of post last year compared to 17 billion in 1995.

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Post Office bosses face cull to stem £2m losses

Posted by | Aug 9, 2006 | |

The Post Office has written to 4,000 senior managers — a third of the workforce — asking for volunteers for redundancy as part of its drive to reduce losses of GBP 2 million a week.
The cutbacks, part of a shake-up of the Post Office, come on top of 30,000 redundancies announced by Royal Mail two years ago.
Three of Royal Mail’s four subsidiaries make a profit. Royal Mail Letters made GBP 344 million last year, Parcelforce has profits of GBP 5 million a year and overseas business makes GBP 100 million a year.
But they are being dragged down by the Post Office, which had a loss of GBP 111 million last year. It has lost 30 per cent of its business in the past five years because of internet banking and changes in the way benefits are paid.

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Life through the letterbox : A snapshot of 21st century living

Posted by | Aug 8, 2006 | |

In the first study of its kind ever conducted, Royal Mail has delivered a unique insight into the nation’s social and consumer habits by analysing more than 20 million items of mail sent and received by UK households over a decade.

The ‘Life through the Letterbox’ study reveals the impact of changing demographics and social trends on the UK population and uncovers fundamental differences between the regions’ postbags.

Analysis of 40 different categories of mail received between 1995 and 2005 reveals, i.e.:
• The nation’s appetite for the good things in life resulted in deliveries of alcohol, food and hampers to homes in the UK increasing from 9.5 million to 39.7 million
• Sales of clothing and shoes were subdued on the High Street*, but home shopping boosted deliveries from 52.5 million to 173.5 million
• People were more likely to speculate to accumulate than a decade earlier, with mail regarding shares increased from 32 million to 40 million
• The DIY generation took to their gardens with gusto as deliveries of gardening equipment and plants soared from 24.8 million to 67.4 million
• Deliveries of sports equipment were up from 4.1 million to 11 million as efforts to stay active increased

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Deliveries set to be more colourful

Posted by | Aug 8, 2006 | |

Postal deliveries are set to get more colourful in the north west – and bike-riding posties dressed in bright orange could soon be a familiar sight.

For a rival to Royal Mail is planning to have a team of delivery men and women in place by Christmas.

They will be dressed in orange because it is the company colour of TNT, part of the Royal Dutch Post Office.

With post office deregulation in Britain, a subsidiary of the firm – TNT Post North West – has been launched to cater for bulk deliveries for small and medium-sized companies.

The company collects, sorts and franks mail from SMEs then passes them to the Royal Mail to deliver, all for a discounted rate of around 19.5p a letter, as opposed to 23p from Royal Mail.

But TNT Post North West is aiming to grow its volume to such an extent that it will complete the service, with its own orange-uniformed postmen and postwomen making the deliveries.

The company, set up in March, has a staff of six, and is based in Audenshaw, but is poised to move to larger premises in Denton.

MD Andrew Goddard hopes the firm will be handling 15 million items in its first year.

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