COVENTRY MESSAGE BOARD

With stamps now costing £1.65 each, we sent 100 cards to test the Christmas post



Millions of us are posting presents and cards to loved ones across the UK and crossing our fingers that they will arrive by Christmas within the timeframes promised by Royal Mail. But will they?

Money Mail decided to find out. We sent 100 Christmas cards to family and friends around the country and the world to find out how long it would take for them to arrive.

We sent the cards using first-class stamps, which means that those sent to addresses in the UK should have landed on people’s doormats the next working day.

But, just 16 of the cards we sent from the Daily Mail offices in Kensington, London, on December 4 arrived on time. Some eight households are still waiting for theirs.

From what we’ve seen, it is no wonder that one in ten people who usually send Christmas cards will not this year, according to a survey, and that sales of boxed cards fell by 23 per cent at John Lewis in 2024.

As the price of stamps continues to rise and post regularly fails to arrive on time, growing numbers are simply giving up.

Of the cards sent by Money Mail, some that have still to arrive were sent to destinations just a few miles away. One card sent to Balham is yet to drop through the letterbox despite two other cards safely arriving in the south-west London area.

Cards sent to Borehamwood in Hertfordshire and Belfast have also yet to turn up. It took ten days for one card to travel just three miles down the road to Putney, London.

Locations where cards were delivered on time include Norfolk, Kensington, Dorking, West Drayton and Penarth.

But friends and family in locations in Australia, as well as Cape Town in South Africa and Los Angeles and South Carolina in the US are still waiting on their Christmas cards.

The poor service is even more galling considering the price of a first-class stamp shot up yet again in October, from £1.35 to £1.65. This means a book of eight first-class stamps now costs an extra 22 per cent at £13.20 and a book of six first-class stamps costs £9.90.

October’s price increase came just months after the previous price rise in April and another hike in October last year. Before this they were £1.10, 55p lower than today’s cost.

A Royal Mail spokesman says: ‘Our independently regulated quality of service reporting shows that the vast majority of items arrive within one day and 92 per cent arrive within two days.'

Longford to Wyken!

Royal Mail accused of faking deliveries



Royal Mail managers have been accused of faking deliveries in order to preserve their yearly bonuses, The Telegraph can reveal.

Postal workers claimed they have been told to record some parcel deliveries as “inaccessible”, even if they never attempted to deliver the item.

That means customer operations managers would still receive their mid-year bonuses, understood to be based in part on hitting targets for the number of parcels that leave Royal Mail depots.

It risks parcels failing to arrive in time for Christmas across the country, and follows reports that some customers have been receiving “attempted deliveries” emails despite receiving no knock at the door.

On Monday night, Justin Madders, the minister for postal services, said he was “disturbed” by the reports and called on Royal Mail to investigate.

The Telegraph spoke to a number of postal workers who reported being told to scan items as “inaccessible”. One claimed he had seen managers ask for parcels to be reported as such “three or four times” in the past month, adding: “I can’t honestly say I’d know what would happen if I refused to do it, as I never have.

“Obviously, it probably is unethical to do something like that, as it is dishonest – and the customer is expecting their parcel. I don’t feel comfortable doing it. There is a culture of greed from the managers, and they just care about their bonuses.”

Another told The Telegraph that the rural area for which he is responsible had “30 to 40 parcels” that there was not time to deliver left at the end of each day. He said: “They tell us to scan these parcels as ‘inaccessible’.”

Scanning a parcel as “inaccessible” sends a customer a message to say that the delivery was attempted and another attempt will be made the following day. The postal worker said: “That’s a lie.”

Some customers have reported receiving “inaccessible” emails despite not hearing a knock at the door and seeing no evidence of a delivery attempt on their doorbell cameras.

Another postman, based in Scotland, said colleagues were often pushed into emptying their “frame” – the term for all post assigned to them on a shift – even if some would inevitably be taken back undelivered because of time pressures.

“Morale is on the floor, there’s a high level of turnover for staff and there’s not enough people to cover overtime,” he said. “The managers will ask [postal workers] to take it all out as they need to report what’s left in the building.”

On Monday, the Communication Workers Union said the findings were “further evidence of complete and deliberate mismanagement of the UK postal services”.

A spokesman said: “This is also symptomatic of a managerial bonus structure that encourages dishonesty and cuts to service over treating employees properly, looking after customers, and growing Royal Mail. It is important the public know that their postal workers have one hand tied behind their backs, and the current situation is no fault of theirs.”

Kevin Hollinrake, a former Post Office minister, said: “It’s disgraceful. If that’s something that is required by management, even localised management, that’s totally unacceptable. This is something that will once again damage Royal Mail’s reputation. In recent years, it’s failed year after year.”

Royal Mail should learn from Dutch post where Czech Sphinx is also involved



When Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds has sorted out his CV and claims to being a solicitor perhaps he might find time to refocus on Royal Mail.

Reynolds, the Communication Workers Union and the flaccid board of Royal Mail-owner International Distribution Services would find it instructive to look at Dutch postal service PostNL.

The Dutch service, like its British counterpart, suffers from the same ills, notably vanishing letter volumes. It shares a common investor in Czech sphinx Daniel Kretinsky, who owns a 30 per cent stake of PostNL.

Kretinsky, designated as a 'legitimate businessman' by Reynolds, has the go ahead to proceed with his £3.6billion (370p-a-share) offer for the Royal Mail owner.

When push came to shove at PostNL, the Czech tycoon, whose wealth stems from running gas pipelines for the Kremlin, failed to step up. Instead, PostNL is seeking a £56m bail-out from the Dutch government which, so far, it refuses to provide.

Kretinsky made a series of pledges to the UK Government on maintaining the Universal Service Obligation (USO) should it win control of IDS. Yet given the Dutch experience and the financing structure of the Czech billionaire's bid, questions must be asked about the future of Britain's postal service under his control.

The finances of the Royal Mail will benefit from the review by regulator Ofcom. If accepted, second-class deliveries will be cut back to twice a week and a premium, more expensive first-class service maintained. This could generate up to £400m of extra income, making a material difference to the prospects of IDS. The board of IDS, in a potential breach of fiduciary duty, has failed to update on the impact. This has infuriated advisers to big battalion minority shareholders.

Kretinsky's public-to-private deal has disaster written all over it. It is financed by £3billion of high-cost debt which, in addition to the £2billion of loans already on IDS's balance sheet, means huge interest bills.

One only must read across to Thames Water and Asda to know that leads down the road to destruction. The scenario is obvious to everyone except Reynolds and his claque at the low-octane Department for Business. Royal Mail properties face being sold. Global Logistics Services (GLS), the European parcels arm, is likely to be hived off or merged and the rump left bereft of investment funds. The plunderers will be huge winners and the backbone of the postal service – the much-loved posties, along with the letter-writing and receiving public – will be the ultimate victims.

Royal Mail fined £21m for missing delivery targets



Royal Mail has been fined £21m for failing to meet delivery targets for the third year in a row and warned fines are likely to continue unless there's an improvement.

As well as failing to meet current delivery times for both first and second class mail, Royal Mail did not meet revised down targets agreed with Ofcom.

The delivery network delivered 77% of first class mail and 92.5% of second-class mail on time from April 2024 to March this year, "well short" of its 93% and 98.5% targets, the communications regulator said.

It's also below the reduced goals which were set out for the delivery company at the start of the year - bringing down the percentage of first class post delivered the next day from 93% to 90%, and second class mail delivered within three days from 98.5% to 95%.

The latest fine is double that levied last year, £10.5m, and nearly quadruple the £5.6m fine in 2023 because of the repeat offending.

It's the third-largest fine ever levied by Ofcom and would have been higher, £30m, but for Royal Mail's admission of wrongdoing and agreement to settle.

Royal Mail has, without justification, failed to provide an acceptable level of service and breached its obligations, Ofcom said.

"It took insufficient and ineffective steps to try and prevent this failure, which is likely to have impacted millions of customers who did not get the service they paid for," it said.

People have also been experiencing times when letters have taken weeks to arrive.

Ian Strawhorne, director of enforcement at Ofcom, said: "Millions of important letters are arriving late, and people aren't getting what they pay for when they buy a stamp.

"These persistent failures are unacceptable, and customers expect and deserve better.

"Royal Mail must rebuild consumers' confidence as a matter of urgency. And that means making actual significant improvements, not more empty promises."

Royal Mail has been ordered by Ofcom to urgently and publicly set out and implement a "credible plan" on how it is going to change.

The regulator said it expects to see "meaningful progress soon", rather than "more empty promises".

Improvements Ofcom had pressed for have not materialised, it said, and Royal Mail has been called on to make "actual significant improvements".

"If this doesn't happen, fines are likely to continue," the regulator warned.

Ofcom said the "persistent failures" are unacceptable, and customers expect and deserve better.

"Royal Mail must rebuild consumers' confidence as a matter of urgency," it added.

The company has also been set a new enforceable target for 99% of mail to be delivered no more than two days late.