Tag: Royal Mail

Postcomm, the independent regulator for postal services, today imposed a financial penalty of GBP 9.62 million on Royal Mail for breaching its licence by failing to properly protect the mail in its care.

The penalty follows a review of Royal Mail’s “mail integrity procedures”, during which Postcomm found that some important features of Royal Mail’s procedures were not being applied across the business.

The penalty was first proposed on 10 February 2006, when Postcomm published a consultation document proposing an amount of GBP 11.38 million. After taking account of representations from Royal Mail and other respondents, Postcomm published its proposal to vary the penalty to GBP 9.62 million on 16 June.

Following consideration of further representations received, Postcomm has confirmed that figure and has today published the penalty notice.

From yesterday, post is no longer charged purely on the basis of weight – the size of a letter or parcel also has to be taken into account.

It was billed as one of the biggest changes to the postal service in recent years.

But within a day of the new sizing system being introduced by the Post Office, customers discovered easy ways to save money. Sending multiple items in separate envelopes can result in significant savings.

Folding an A4 letter in half before it is priced at the post office counter creates a saving of more than 25 per cent.

Sending goods such as CDs in the smallest envelope possible can also bring savings.

The discoveries will encourage businesses which send out hundreds of letters and small parcels every day to review their postal strategy, with the potential to save thousands of pounds.

Placing two paperback books in an A4 envelope results in a charge of Pounds 2.20 but when the books are put in separate small envelopes each one costs only 90p, a saving of 40p.

The extra envelope, however, creates extra sorting and delivery work for the Royal Mail, which is facing opposition from rival companies.

Placing an A4 letter in an A4 envelope costs 44p because it is classed as a “large letter”.

But when the same letter is folded in half and put it in an A5 envelope, the charge is 32p because it is classed as just a “letter”.

THE attitude in Londonderry to yesterday’s newly-introduced mail pricing system was a mixture of confusion and frustrating countdown.

While some customers outside the main Post Office in Custom House Street and the Carlisle Road Post Office predicted confusion, others said it would take a few months ” possibly during the run-up to Christmas ” to feel the full impact of the biggest shake-up the postal system has seen in 165 years.
Janice Tracey, CEO of Londonderry Chamber of Commerce, claimed yesterday it is possible to minimise the impact of the new postage pricing system for all business and residential post.

“From now, businesses will have to pay more attention to the size and shape of post than to the weight in order to avoid being penalised by the changes,’ she said.

Next time you buy a birthday card, ask yourself: is it more than 240 mm long, 165 mm wide or 5 mm thick? If so, then forget about dispatching it with a simple first-class stamp. You will need a “large letter” version. For, as of yesterday, the Royal Mail is categorising post by size as well as weight, in order to “rebalance its prices in line with costs”.

The new arrangement is “fairer and simpler”, says the Royal Mail. Simpler? In that case, we dread to think what a more complicated system would look like.

As for fairer, that also stretches credulity. Pricing in Proportion (PiP), as it is officially known, is likely to prove irritating and expensive for small businesses and associations, which may now have to choose between paying more for very light A4 letters and laboriously folding them.

These fears are groundless, says the Royal Mail: far from being a bizarre innovation, PiP is already used by the Japanese, German and Singaporean post offices – where, unsurprisingly, it runs with formidable efficiency.
And then there is the effect on post offices themselves. In rural areas, struggling sub-post offices usually provide a friendly and helpful service. Their urban equivalents, in contrast, are often appalling places, with their stained carpets, faded 1980s interior design – and, above all, insufferable snaking queues, which are so long that advertisers station video screens for shuffling customers.

For years, it has taken Stakhanovite determination to enter a city centre post office; one look at the ratio of staffed to unstaffed booths is enough to make the heart sink. Just imagine how protracted your visit could become now that letters have to be measured as well as weighed. Thank God for e-mail.

Confused customers say changes to the cost of sending letters and parcels will cause long delays in post offices.

Royal Mail has changed the first and second class system and replaced it with 29 pricing categories.

Under the changes, introduced yesterday, it will cost no more to send most letters.

However, it will be more expensive to send some larger items, regardless of how heavy they are.

Customers said the system was too complicated, while experts said not enough warning had been given to allow people to prepare for the price rises.

Small businesses leaders have warned firms could resort to passing the extra mailing costs on to consumers.

Royal Mail said the overhaul was necessary because it was more expensive to sort and deliver bulkier items and a multi-million pound advertising campaign had made the system easy to understand.

A spokeswoman from the post office in High Street, Great Easton, Harborough, said: “The rate bands have increased – so, if you send a first class item, you can make it up to 100g when it used to be 60g.

“We had a man with a letter who sent it for 90p when it would have cost GBP 1.90 before.

“Most of our regular users will save money.”

However, many customers at Leicester’s main post office, in Bishop Street, said the system was confusing and would cause longer delays.