The cost of posting heavier mail and standard parcels is to increase in the New Year, the Royal Mail announced today.
First and second class post above 350g in weight will rise adding 1p to an item which costs £1.30 now.
Read MoreMore than 600 Christmas staff have been hired by the Royal Mail in Birmingham to handle up to four million items a day.
The army of temporary recruits has been put in place as staff across the Birmingham postcode district process around 24.5 million items in the countdown to Christmas. Meanwhile, a total of 1.5 million parcels will pass through the West Midlands this week alone as volumes soar by almost 20 per cent in the last few days before Christmas.
A Birmingham Royal Mail spokesman said: ‘We expect to handle around 24.5 million items during our busiest week, with over four million on the busiest day.
Read MoreThe new chief executive at Royal Mail, the post office group, is to be offered a pay package that could hit Pounds 1m a year.
The basic salary will be more than Pounds 500,000, but the successful candidate will then have a bonus and long-term incentive plan. While the three-year targets of returning the company to profitability are demanding, it is believed they are achievable.
Read MoreAn extra runway should be built at Liverpool John Lennon Airport, business leaders argued last night.
The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) has advised the Government that the Speke site should expand to help industry.
Liverpool JLA handles large volumes of freight and is the main hub for Royal Mail services in the North of England.
The CBI’s recommendation comes in response to a consultation document on options for the future of air transport in the UK.
A final decision on national expansion will be made by the Government next year.
Read MoreWhile the Royal Mail is struggling through its busiest week of the year (120m letters and cards on Monday alone), Postcomm, the postal services regulator, will be meeting to talk about that most festive of subjects, price controls. In the nine months or so since the Royal Mail asked for a penny increase on the price of first and second class stamps, there has been a lot of bitter argument about what controls should accompany the increase. The nub of the disagreement is that Postcomm wants a freeze on “average” prices – which, according to Allan Leighton, the chairman of the Royal Mail, would cost the business pounds 460m. Now I reckon Postcomm will give in to Leighton’s demands for a simpler control on individual postal services, not least because there are much bigger issues to be resolved. And because the more radical Postcomm wants to be, the louder Leighton will shout. The most important among these issues is whether the Royal Mail should be split up so that a separated delivery network (including vans, posties and maybe sorting offices) can be used by any number of companies that want to supply postal services. This is not rocket science. It has happened in most UK industries (except telecoms) where the incumbent service provider owns all the infrastructure, simply because it is seen as the only way to get fair play for new market entrants. Just ask any bruised telecoms business that has struggled over the years to compete with the enduring might (and huge legal department) of unreconstructed BT. There are two separate questions here. One is whether there is a case for splitting the Royal Mail. Although to do so right now could be a bit previous, I believe the answer over the long term is probably yes. The second is whether the regulator, having reached whatever conclusion he reaches, has the guts and the competence to follow it through.
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