Tag: Postwatch

Royal Mail today vowed to “fight for every letter” following the New Year’s Day postal revolution in which it will lose its 350-year monopoly on deliveries.

The UK’s postal service market will be opened up on January 1, allowing rival companies to collect, sort and deliver mail for the first time since the reign of Charles II.

Royal Mail faces competition from 14 companies which have already registered with regulator Postcomm to handle post in the UK, including German firm Deutsche Post and Dutch postal service TNT.

Most of the competition is expected to be in business mail, which accounts for 80% of the market and helped boost Royal Mail profits by 20% to £159 million in the first half of 2005.

In a landmark Judgment the High Court has found in favour of the postal watchdog, Postwatch, against the economic regulator, Postcomm. This is the first time a Consumer Council has successfully Judicially Reviewed an industry regulator. Millie Banerjee, Chair of Postwatch, commenting on the High Court’s decision said: “We are, of course, delighted the Judgment is in our favour. This is an important outcome ensuring Royal Mail’s customers receive the GBP40 million of withheld compensation they were due for service failures in 2003/04. Customers have been patient but hopefully can now see light at the end of what has been a long legal tunnel. One of our first challenges is to put in place the processes that will ensure Postwatch and Postcomm work jointly to achieve the right outcomes for customers. Royal Mail now needs to deliver what the Court has decided and pay in full the compensation due to customers.”

Thousands of Royal Mail customers who have received poor service could be in line for new compensation payments following a High Court ruling today. The Consumer Council for Postal Services, known as Postwatch, won a legal challenge against Postcomm, the UK postal regulatory body. The case arose after Postcomm refused last January to order the Royal Mail, which has already paid out some GBP35 million, to pay another GBP35 million to users of bulk mail services which were not up to standard. Postcomm declined to make an enforcement order under the 2000 Postal Services Act for the financial year 2003-4. Postwatch argued that Postcomm was under a statutory duty to enforce. Today, Mr Justice Sullivan, sitting at the High Court in London, ruled in favour of Postwatch but gave Postcomm and Royal Mail time to consider appealing to the Court of Appeal.

Postwatch, the consumer body for postal services, has mounted a legal challenge in London’s High Court over a refusal by Postcomm, the postal regulator, to force Royal Mail to pay millions of pounds of compensation to business customers. The case is being brought as a judicial review challenge, with Postwatch arguing that the regulator’s interpretation of a clause in the statutory compensation scheme has allowed Royal Mail to undercompensate users of bulk mail services by up to Pounds 35m. “There is no doubt that in the financial year 2003-4, the first year for which the scheme applies, Royal Mail failed to meet any of the quality of service targets under their licence,” David Pannick QC, representing Postwatch, said yesterday. “We estimate that what would otherwise be compensation of Pounds 70m for the aggrieved customers of the inadequate service has been reduced to compensation of Pounds 35m by reason of the disputed interpretation adopted by Postcomm.”