Tag: Europe

UK users turning to fax machines and scanners to beat Royal Mail action

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

Fax machines, scanners and online fax-to-email services have seen increased sales and usage as UK users try to beat the postal strike.

PC World and Currys reported that fax machine sales are up 25 per cent, and scanner sales 20 per cent, since the dispute began.

Online service Efax said that it had witnessed increases of “around 15 per cent” during the strike period.

“We have seen a run on faxes and scanners this week as customers have been flocking to buy them,” said Niall O’Keeffe, marketing director at PC World.

“We thought that faxes were heading for extinction with the advent of broadband, but the recent industrial action has caused us to think twice.”

Paul Geoghegan, general manager of finance at Efax, claimed that his company had also benefited during the industrial action at Royal Mail.

“There is not a uniform increase across the UK but initial figures show it’s between 12 and 20 per cent, so it probably works out around 15 per cent,” he said.

As well as running its own service, Efax handles the fax-to-email service for ‘on demand’ fax solutions provider YAC.

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Royal Mail strikes

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

Royal Mail postal workers began the first of two 48-hour strikes on Thursday 4 October. The Communication Workers Union, which represents 130,000 members of staff at the UK’s main postal service, opposes modernization plans, which it claims will result in the loss of over 40,000 jobs, longer shifts and a paltry pay packet for their members, who are already treated like slaves, says CWU Deputy General Secretary Dave Ward. The second 48-hour strike started last Monday, with further stoppages expected by mail centre and airport staff early next week. The CWU says it will embark on a rolling programme of strikes from 15 October until the dispute is resolved. According to The Sunday Telegraph, although the immediate cost of the strikes to Royal Mail will be £50m-£60m, it could eventually cost the company up to £260m.

Since the liberalisation of the postal market in 2006, 17 other companies have started delivering post alongside Royal Mail. They have already taken 40 pct of the lucrative corporate mail market and have won Government contracts from the main postal service. Royal Mail claims the failure to restructure has also cost it a recent £8m deal with Amazon, the online retailer. According to Royal Mail Chairman Allan Leighton on a recent edition of Sky News, its rivals in the postal market are 40 pct more efficient; the Royal Mail has yet to move to fully automated letter sorting, for instance. John Hutton, the minister responsible for the Royal Mail, says that “there’s no future for the business if it’s locked into the perennial cycle of industrial action… It is going to lose market share.” Couriergram, the UK-wide telegraph service, has already taken a third more business since the strike started.

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High Court outlaws Royal Mail postal strikes

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

A High Court judge this evening granted an injunction by Royal Mail to block more strikes on Monday and Tuesday as its long-running dispute with the main postal union became increasingly bitter.

The postal group went to the High Court today for an injunction to stop fresh official strikes as illegal wildcat action spread to about 60 operations, involving more than 4,000 employees.

On Wednesday, when four days of official national strikes ended, wildcat walkouts began at 24 Royal Mail centers in protest at new shift patterns.

Today the unofficial action hit Edinburgh and Grangemouth along with the previously affected areas of south and east London and Liverpool. The wildcat action is halting work at major mail sorting centers and delivery operations, leaving some areas without post for more than a week.

Royal Mail has now lost more than one million working days to strikes since the Communication Workers Union began industrial action in July. The dispute – one of the worst in the organisation’s history – is over pay, pensions, job cuts and working patterns. It is Royal Mail’s demand for greater flexibility in working hours that is causing the biggest problem for settling the dispute.

Talks continue between the union and Royal Mail at the TUC, chaired by the TUC general secretary Brendan Barber. The TUC has now hosted more than a week of virtually round-the-clock talks.

Royal Mail’s injunction claims that the union had given flawed notification of the strikes. Although the union gave notice within the proper timeframe of a week, proper notification also requires that every workplace affected is properly detailed. Royal Mail’s solicitors provided a 15-page petition to the High Court saying that the notification was not filed properly.

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Small business is big loser in UK postal strike

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

Small businesses are one of the biggest losers in the on-going postal strike, industry leaders said.

As the long-running dispute rumbles on, with postal workers staging a third day of unofficial strike action, the Federation of Small Businesses said its members were being badly affected.

Spokesman Simon Briault said a whole range of businesses, from building and plumbing firms to mail order companies were being hit. The federation said 94 pct of its members exclusively use the Royal Mail – many to send cheques and invoices through the post.

‘The other 6 pct who use alternative mail carriers often rely on the Royal Mail for that last mile,’ Mr Briault said.

In a survey on postal services carried out by the federation, 88 pct of respondents said they send post every day, while 69 pct said they send invoices through the post. The federation said business mail constitutes 87 pct of mail sent and the small business dependence on the postal system in the UK should not be underestimated.

Mr Briault said a lot of small businesses still used cheques to do business and these were being delayed in the post. He added: ‘When that is disrupted it has a direct impact on cashflow. Small business don’t have big profit margins.

‘They have to borrow more money from the bank which results in them paying more interest charges. Small business contribute 50 pct to the GDP. This postal strike is a massive issue.

Talks aimed at resolving the long-running dispute will resume later today in a bid to avert a fresh round of official strikes called by the Communication Workers Union from next Monday. Up to 130,000 union members have held two 48-hour strikes in the past week which crippled mail deliveries across the country.

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New bank for SMBs integrates banking & accounting

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

Bizner, which started in February as an online bank for entrepreneurs, just announced a new service. Bizner is the first bank in Europe to offer complete integration of banking and accounting, which it calls BizBalance. The aim of this financial hybrid is to save customers the time and hassle of booking transactions twice.

Bizner developed BizBalance with Reeleezee, which creates of online accounting applications. By integrating Reeleezee’s bookkeeping software with Bizner’s online banking, entrepreneurs (or their accountants) no longer need to book outgoing invoices and incoming payments separately. Invoices are created in Reeleezee, and are automatically marked as paid as soon as money’s in the bank. Same goes for incoming invoices and outgoing payments: users book an invoice to be paid, and a bank transfer is simultaneously set up and parked in a payment queue.

While various forms of integration between banks and accounting systems already exist, most either require significant IT investments or, on a smaller scale, involve manual importing and exporting of data. By offering a integrated, online solution, Bizner claims customers will have a far better real-time insight into their finances. To access BizBalance, entrepreneurs need to sign up with both Bizner and Reeleezee. Bizner charges modest banking fees, and Reeleezee has a monthly fee of EUR 24.95–49.90, depending on a customer’s transaction volume.

Bizner is an independent unit of Dutch Rabobank Group. BizBalance isn’t the fledgling bank’s only innovation: it works without branch offices or account managers, and enables customers to do most of their banking business without human intervention. Opening new accounts, acquiring bank guarantees or taking out loans: entrepreneurs use Bizner’s self-service approach to get what they need from their bank, whenever they need it. One to look into if you sell financial products to SMBs in other countries!

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