TNT deal rescues MPS cash shortfall (UK)
TNT Post has eased the pressure on the funding shortfall faced by the Mailing Preference Service (MPS) by agreeing to support the organisation which funds the scheme.
Nick Wells, Chief Executive of TNT Post, confirmed that the private postal operator has written to its customers to ask their permission to add an extra charge to their invoices to contribute towards the fund.
The Advertising Board of Finance (Asbof) collects the levy which pays for self-regulatory schemes, such as the MPS, and the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA).
Royal Mail currently collects 0.2 per cent of brand owners’ direct mail spend, which it passes on to Asbof to fund these schemes, but until now new entrants to the postal market have not collected any money, fuelling fears that the schemes could be doomed. This is despite the fact that nearly half of all downstream access mail volumes are now handled by private operators.
Asbof chairman Winston Fletcher says: “We’re absolutely delighted that TNT Post is supporting the self-regulation of direct marketing in this way. Self-regulation cannot work without funding and the fact that the largest independent mail operator, TNT Post, has come aboard is clear evidence of how important self-regulation is to the direct marketing industry.”
Fletcher hopes that many of the other independent postal operators will follow TNT Post’s lead.
The move comes at a time when the Government is piling pressure on the industry to expand the MPS. The DMA has been encouraging the industry to back self-regulation to avoid the implementation of opt-in legislation as threatened by the Government.
Earlier this year, Asbof board member Charles Ping warned the MPS would be “buggered” unless more client companies started paying the levy.
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