Tag: UK

Kenya to chair 24th UPU Congress in Geneva and future Council of Administration

Posted by | Jun 12, 2008 | |

Kenya will chair the 24th Universal Postal Congress in Geneva from 23 July to 12 August 2008 as well as the UPU’s Council of Administration for 2009-2012.

The Kenyan Government has confirmed that Mr. Bishar A. Hussein, a former Postmaster General of Kenya Post and currently Kenya’s Ambassador to the United Arab Emirates, will chair the Congress.

When the UPU Council of Administration decided last February to change the venue of the 24th Universal Postal Congress from Nairobi to Geneva, it also passed a resolution inviting Kenya to chair the Congress and the future Council of Administration. Kenya has now formally accepted these invitations.

Kenya will also chair the Council of Administration for 2009-2012, a UPU body made up of 41 member countries and responsible for overseeing the organization’s finances, international postal regulations and strategic direction of the Union between Congresses.

In other Congress news, France’s Edouard Dayan, current UPU Director General, and China’s Guozhong Huang, current Deputy Director General, will run for a second four-year mandate. No other candidates have stepped forward for the top UPU jobs.
So far, Great Britain, Greece, the Russian Federation and Switzerland have announced their candidacy for the chairmanship of the Postal Operations Council, a 40-member UPU body in charge of overseeing a range of postal operational issues such as security, quality of service, technical cooperation and development, postal financial services and more. Other countries could still announce their candidacy up until Congress.

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Ongoing delivery problems in Edinburgh (UK)

Posted by | Jun 12, 2008 | |

Postwatch Scotland published the results of a second study of the delivery service residents in EH3 are experiencing. This follows a study undertaken in 2006 which revealed considerable problems in the area, after which Royal Mail promised to introduce a number of improvements, including having more regular delivery officers on the routes.

One in five has suffered lost post, while 17 per cent have had letters and parcels delayed, according to a survey by Postwatch Scotland. It said the results in the EH3 postcode area, which includes Edinburgh’s New Town, were “symptomatic of the problems Royal Mail has in delivering to the whole of Scotland”.

In 2006, Postwatch Scotland carried out a study of more than 400 addresses which showed seven out of ten had experienced misdelivery, more than half had received mail for entirely different addresses and one in three had been given post that was meant for neighbours in the same building.

The study covers delivery experiences between 2nd January and 31st March 2008

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Royal Mail supports customer publishing industry through research incentive (UK)

Posted by | Jun 12, 2008 | |

Royal Mail is demonstrating its commitment to the customer publishing industry by offering a financial incentive to organisations to benchmark their publications and improve their marketing value.
The initiative, part of a strengthening of Royal Mail’s relationship with the Association of Publishing Agencies (APA), means that customer publishers can save GBP 2,000 from the cost of having the effectiveness of their titles measured through the acclaimed Royal Mail APA Advantage Study.
Launched in 2005, the Royal Mail APA Advantage Study tracks customer magazine effectiveness as a valuable marketing tool and shows how titles perform against others in their sector.
The study currently features 70 magazines and over 20,000 customer interviews, conducted by Millward Brown, making it one of the largest pieces of media research in the UK and more cost effective for publishers than undertaking their own analysis.
Julia Hutchison, COO of APA, said: “The initiative means The Advantage Study will now be co-branded between Royal Mail and APA. The results that have been delivered as a result of the Advantage Study have to date been one of the main reasons for the astonishing growth of this medium.
“Proving that customer magazines are read on average for 25 minutes, deliver a 44 per cent response rate, eight per cent sales uplift and 32 per cent brand loyalty is a highly persuasive argument in convincing marketers that a customer magazine is a must have in the marketing plan.”

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UK Post Office's GBP 150m subsidy 'in jeopardy'

Posted by | Jun 11, 2008 | |

The government’s financial support for post offices may be jeopardised if the network fails to win a tender to run the card account through which millions are paid benefits, MPs were warned yesterday.

Brussels has approved a government subsidy of GBP 150m a year to enable Royal Mail to run a network of 11,500 post offices by keeping loss-making branches open. But Post Office Ltd’s managing director, Alan Cook, said winning the card account was crucial in meeting state aid rules.

The government has put the card account out to tender from 2011 and Cook said: “The grounds of approval (from Brussels) are on the back of having the card account.”

The loss of other government work and a decline in the number of people using the card account had posed problems for the network, Cook told the all-party business and enterprise committee. If it lost the tender, the reduction in the level of services it would be providing would make it hard for the government to secure renewal of the social network payment, he said.

Post Office Ltd is closing 2,500 branches as part of its plans to curb heavy losses made by the network. Government funding will enable it to retain 11,500.

Cook told the committee the company would oppose any plans to shrink the network further but added that Post Office Ltd had to work within the limits of the funding provided by the government.

He revealed 100 local authorities had expressed interest in an initiative being pioneered by Essex County Council to take on post offices being closed under the network change programme.

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Spain is eurozone bargain for motoring holidays in Europe

Posted by | Jun 11, 2008 | |

Spain emerges as the best value destination for UK holidaymakers in Europe in a new report by Post Office® Travel Services – despite the fact that pump prices in Switzerland have made it cheapest for unleaded petrol for the second year running.¹

In its’ Motoring on the Continent report, the Post Office® reveals that Switzerland is now the only major motoring holiday destination where unleaded fuel costs less than GBP 1 per litre.

However, the report places Spain as best value across Europe for both diesel fuel and motoring in a hire car. At GBP 1 per litre, it is also cheapest in the eurozone for unleaded petrol. Prices are around 30 per cent lower than in either Belgium or the Netherlands, which are popular motoring holiday choices for UK tourists.

The cost of unleaded petrol rose substantially in all 12 countries surveyed over the past 12 months. Increases ranged from 20 per cent in Italy and the UK to 32 per cent in France. But, although these figures make the much-debated rise in UK petrol prices look comparatively modest, the falling value of sterling masks the true position in Europe.

Post Office® head of travel Helen Warburton said: “Sterling has fallen in value by 14 per cent against the euro in the past year – and by even more in the other motoring holiday destinations. When we extracted this percentage from the price rises, we found that the UK had suffered the highest underlying price hike – 20 per cent at the pumps.

The report paints a very different picture for UK holidaymakers travelling to Europe in a diesel car. Spain is the cheapest destination by a wide margin. At 94p for a litre of diesel it is seven per cent cheaper than its nearest rival Austria (GBP 1.01) but 26 per cent lower than the UK, where diesel prices are some of Europe’s most expensive.

The differential between unleaded petrol and diesel was most marked in the UK and Sweden, with diesel costing 13p and 16p per litre more respectively. However the Post Office® found that diesel costs significantly less than unleaded fuel in four countries – the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and Spain.

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