Tag: Royal Mail

UK PPA warns lifting of postal controls will hit B2B sector

Posted by | Jun 9, 2005 | |

Business-to-business magazines that depend on doorstep distribution could suffer under plans to end price controls on press postage, the Periodical Publishers’ Association (PPA) has warned. The current Presstream system, which forces Royal Mail to keep prices low for subscription-based magazines, will be unregulated from April 2006 under proposals from the postal services regulator, Postcomm. Postcomm said it believed publishers would be protected from soaring prices because there was sufficient competition in the market to keep charges low.

But Ian Locks, PPA chief executive, said: “The competitive playing field for the Presstream service is set within the context of the postal delivery of magazines.

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Business Post Chief Executive predicts UK Royal Mail will have 80% market share

Posted by | Jun 8, 2005 | |

Paul Carvell, Chief Executive of Business Post Group plc, has predicted that, following liberalisation of the postal market, Royal Mail will retain a profitable 80% share of the UK market. Mr Carvell said that the 20% which the Royal Mail would lose would fall into two categories. Some 15% would probably be shared by four competitors which would provide a nationwide service, and a further 5% would go to city centre specialist deliverers. Speaking today at The Logistics Event conference on the subject of “Competing for the Post”, he said that the UK domestic mail market was worth GBP5.8 billion per year, while the international market was worth a further GBP0.8 billion. Since Business Post had moved its first letter in May 2004, the company had now moved more than one hundred million letters.

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SPECIAL REPORT – FULFILMENT: Receiving end

Posted by | Jun 7, 2005 | |

The tenet that the customer is always right does not seem to have permeated the home delivery sphere, with many packages turning up at unspecified, inconvenient times. But with new entrants raising standards, the old school may be forced to mend its ways. Home shopping may be big business, but it is no longer the sole domain of big businesses, with everyone from Amazon to the local corner shop now offering an online or catalogue shopping experience. But while the rest of the retail world has been moving speedily towards home shopping solutions, it would seem that most delivery companies have been standing still. Home shopping exists to cater for consumers who are too busy to visit the high street, so it should come as no surprise that they may not be able to wait at home all day to receive a package.

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Inquiry will back investment claim, says UK Royal Mail chief

Posted by | Jun 5, 2005 | |

Trade and Industry Secretary Alan Johnson is expected to start the Government review into the future of Royal Mail within the next three weeks. Royal Mail has been urging an early start to the review because it believes it will strengthen its case for more cash support from the Government. Chairman Allan Leighton, who is masterminding the privatisation, has said the review will recognise the need for Pounds 2.5 billion of investment.

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ANALYSIS: Stapleton stands firm over postal wrangles

Posted by | Jun 3, 2005 | |

Recent weeks have seen bitter complaints levelled at Postcomm by Royal Mail, Postwatch and direct marketers alike. So chairman Nigel Stapleton has a tough job trying to find some middle ground. Sebastian Burford reports

By anyone’s standards, Postcomm chairman Nigel Stapleton has had a turbulent few weeks. After squaring up to discontented direct marketers at the recent pricing in proportion (PIP) summit (PM last week), this week began with accusations from Postwatch. The postal watchdog claimed the regulator’s tardy introduction of a liberalised market has skewered Royal Mail’s performance targets and amounted to deliberate “misleading”.

The week ends with Stapleton in a war of words over Postcomm’s call for a domestic price freeze until 2010, which Royal Mail’s chairman Allan Leighton has called a “blueprint for the service’s inexorable decline”. Meanwhile, the dust has yet to settle on Royal Mail’s non-payment of compensation for missing the performance targets from the last Postcomm review.

When Stapleton took over the Postcomm chair from Graham Corbett in November 2003, could he have predicted such a rough ride?

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