Royal Mail Late Deliveries and the price we have to pay

[Sue]

16 hours ago, alice said:

Good reason not to send cards tho?

I think the 75p/£1.25 postage is a good reason not to send cards 🤣

[jazzer]

Clearly people want a postal service but some do not want to pay for it and then moan when it fails, I'd suggest use it or lose, is the simple answer. 

[SpringTime]

Expecting it to take two weeks or more, I requested an up to date driver's licence online yesterday afternoon - arrived within 24 hours. Wow!

[Sue]

5 hours ago, jazzer said:

Clearly people want a postal service but some do not want to pay for it and then moan when it fails, I'd suggest use it or lose, is the simple answer. 

The failure has been since the postal service was privatised.

The money we pay is going towards profit for shareholders instead of towards improving the service.

[jazzer]

Next it will be the fault of Thatcher's privatisation. People buy shares and expect a return, perhaps the question to be asking is where did all the money generated from the sale of shares go, what did Royal Mail do with it all? If you know do please tell? I'd guess it went on exorbitant salaries for incompetent CEO's and the like at RM.

[Penguin68]

11 hours ago, jazzer said:

where did all the money generated from the sale of shares go, what did Royal Mail do with it all? If you know do please tell?

For most privatisations the money goes to HMG - who is selling the asset on 'our' behalf. It's not like an IPO. But a significant amount of money I believe was subsequently  taken by the (new) shareholders out of the company (as dividends).

[Burbage]

20 minutes ago, Penguin68 said:

For most privatisations the money goes to HMG - who is selling the asset on 'our' behalf.

This is right.

Though, of course, Royal Mail isn't Royal Mail any more. It's now International Distributions Systems (IDS), which is a holding company. One part of which just happens to be Royal Mail. And it's Royal Mail that's subject (unlike the more profitable parcels business) to the Universal Service Obligation.

This "restructuring" follows a time-honoured tradition that's been in place since ever limited liability was a thing. The key is that a parent company is not liable for the liabilities of its subsidiaries.

So the trick in any "restructuring" is to take the toxic stuff (all the bits that are unprofitable, or are heavily regulated), and put them in one subsidiary, and put all the nice profitable bits in another. In the case of the bank crisis, that was done to separate toxic loans from lovely long-term mortgages. In the case of IDS, it might be to separate the business of taking postcards to Auchtermuchty from the business of hauling fancy dogfood round Canary Wharf.

Once that's done, then the toxic side can simply be shuttered, and all its debts and obligations disappear. The parent company might have to hand it to administrators who can (very rarely, and only if there's recent evidence of egregious behaviour) claw back a little money from parent-company shareholders, but if it can be argued it collapsed because the profits weren't there to be made (the Universal Service Obligation is a great help there), then they can't.

So IDS's job may have been a tricky one - it would take a lot of tedious juggling to invisibly separate the two sides of Royal Mail. Splitting accounts, assets, payrolls etc., and stripping the property assets, without affecting the appearance of business-as-usual, can't be easy. So it would be hardly surprising if side-issues, such as industrial relations or delivering post, were forced to take a back seat.

But if that's what they've done, then can then trickle along to Parliament and ask for the Universal Service Obligation to effectively disappear, on threat of shuttering Royal Mail. Parliament will then have to decide what to do. It might, indeed, do away with the whole idea of post, as we know it and, as in some parts of the world, decide it's sufficient to have a community mailbox within a few miles of any address and deliver whenever it's "practicable" (which might be an improvement on the nothing we've got now).

Or it mightn't wait for Royal Mail to shutter itself, and renationalise it, instead. Or as is more customary these days, hand it to an offshore concern along with a juicy sweetener (see much of the "British" steel/car/battery industries and, in all likelihood, Thames Water again), and let some other government sort it all out.

But, either way, the institutional shareholders (less than 20% are private investors), will get to keep a nice money-making business, and all the dividends they've pocketed along the way, as well as at least two parcels of mine.

[Penguin68]

And for many privatisations the current beneficial owners will have leveraged debt, loading up the company bought with debt which is costly to manage (to the privatised company) whilst taking revenues as dividends. I'm not sure of Royal Mail's indebtedness - but that's absolutely the route to riches for e.g. privatised water company owners.

On the original topic of the thread, I've had no normal post delivery since 29th November (previously I was getting 3-4 deliveries a week in the south end of Underhill). Nothing yet in December, which sets fair to be a repeat of last year, when I received 5 cards before Christmas and around 70 afterwards, deliveries dribbling to a close in early February. Oh, and periodicals were also a month and a half late - Christmas editions are fairly pointless at the end of January! Forget about a Universal Service Obligation - an any service obligation (in exchange for the exorbitant stamps) would be nice. 

The un-privatised Royal Mail managed to make 3-4 deliveries a day over Christmas (including Sundays) for the princely sum of 2.5d (not p) an item, if unsealed, when I was young(er). And still, I believe, was solvent.

Edited December 5, 2023 by Penguin68

[Jules-and-Boo]

And now Highshore Rd office is only open from 8am to 10am

[Sue]

I have just received my first Christmas card, posted 18 November. 

Usually this arrives in November 🤣

Not the same one, obviously, but from the same people. With a lengthy handwritten letter 😮

Edited December 5, 2023 by Sue
Adding information

[bob]

No post since Tuesday last week 

Bob S

[FredCasa]

A Royal Mail parcel delivery man told me that on our round (Marmora, Therapia etc) one postman is on long-term sick leave and hasn’t been replaced, the other one has been put on nights so can’t deliver letters either.

Complained to Royal Mail, copy to Harriet Harman. Tomorrow I’ll deliver a letter to the sorting office manager at Highshore Road. 

Will this ever get better again? Maybe they should privatise Royal Mail to make it more efficient. Ha ha.
 

 

 

[Angelina]

I'm still not in receipt of my parcel - been to Highshore Road and now it's lost.

It takes around an hour to get through on the phone number and the on hold music is diabolical.

 

[bob]

First Post in 13 days 18 items some from early November late October 

Bob S

[sqw103]

I've been complaining on Twitter and email directly to complaints website of Royal Mail, earlier this autumn and again this week. Has anyone any suggestions for making a collective stand to try to force RM to at least provide us with a twice weekly service by moving staff from places where they currently provide a six-day-a-week service (if they can't recruit more people locally)? Suggestions:

* Ask the local sorting office to let us collect our post from there if they won't deliver to us directly (this system works fine in at least some other European countries).

* Get a petition going, should be able to gather hundreds of signatures, to raise pressure, but I don't know who to send it to.

* Organise a demo outside the sorting office one day and try to get local press involved. However local press have already covered this and there was something again recently on the BBC local news (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-63780196).

* Helen Hayes clearly knows about the problem but I don't know if she is actually able to do much about it. 

* Has anyone tried contacting their local councillors?

Any other ideas?

Susannah

 

 

[Sue]

1 hour ago, sqw103 said:

I've been complaining on Twitter and email directly to complaints website of Royal Mail, earlier this autumn and again this week. Has anyone any suggestions for making a collective stand to try to force RM to at least provide us with a twice weekly service by moving staff from places where they currently provide a six-day-a-week service (if they can't recruit more people locally)? Suggestions:

* Ask the local sorting office to let us collect our post from there if they won't deliver to us directly (this system works fine in at least some other European countries).

* Get a petition going, should be able to gather hundreds of signatures, to raise pressure, but I don't know who to send it to.

* Organise a demo outside the sorting office one day and try to get local press involved. However local press have already covered this and there was something again recently on the BBC local news (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-63780196).

* Helen Hayes clearly knows about the problem but I don't know if she is actually able to do much about it. 

* Has anyone tried contacting their local councillors?

Any other ideas?

Susannah

 

 

Yes. Reverse the privatisation.

I know, I know - pigs might fly 🙄

[Penguin68]

13 hours ago, sqw103 said:

* Helen Hayes clearly knows about the problem but I don't know if she is actually able to do much about it. 

* Has anyone tried contacting their local councillors?

When Helen Hayes has written on my behalf I have received large amounts of undelivered mail - but then the service has again deteriorated. Letters from MPs are treated as urgent (historically, pre-privatisation, they might. if ignored, end in a PQ (Parliamentary Question) which nobody wanted - and that is still a mind-set in the Chairman's Office. Letters from councillors are ignored.

[tiddles]

No mail for 2 weeks on northcross road  

[bob]

Same here emaild Helen 2 days later 18 items last Friday nothing since then

[Earl Aelfheah]

Royal Mail are completely unreliable. Items recorded as delivered when they have not been and the website just takes you round in circles. 

[jazzer]

Gotta say have sent items 2nd class across the SW and they both arrived on time and in perfect condition, so as much as there are concerns about RM's performance, personally they have delivered as per the targets.

However what is a concern is that the Delivery Office behind Forest Hill station have reduced opening hours to two hours a day 8-10am M-F and 8-12 Sat. They seem to be relying on the "newly" introduced automatic next day delivery for missed deliveries. So far I've had one hit and one miss with this.  

[dulwich1955]

since i opened this discussion my god i did not think the problem was so big and lasting so long. i thought all this was because they closed the east Dulwich sorting office. Good people of East Dulwich  what are we going to do about our Post... we cant just  sit and do nothing thats what Royal Mail want....i am still trying to find a way that i can take to Legally take Royal Mail to court and the so called Adjudicator who held me fully responsible for the late post and Punished me for it. they really are getting away with it and the  royal mail is treating us like mugs.

i wish you all a very peaceful and very Happy Christmas.

[Rockets]

Not sure if anyone else is having problems with stolen parcels as well. We have had two parcels from Royal Mail that were "delivered" but the photo proof of delivery was a blurred photo of nothing and nothing was delivered. We had another one a couple of days ago where there happened to be another Royal Mail parcel driver outside our house and we thought he was delivering it but the note we had from Royal Mail said that it had been delivered 15 minutes before. As soon as the other Royal Mail parcel delivery guy saw the blurred photo he said: "they've nicked it". Anyone else had any similar issues?

[Sue]

31 minutes ago, Rockets said:

Not sure if anyone else is having problems with stolen parcels as well. We have had two parcels from Royal Mail that were "delivered" but the photo proof of delivery was a blurred photo of nothing and nothing was delivered. We had another one a couple of days ago where there happened to be another Royal Mail parcel driver outside our house and we thought he was delivering it but the note we had from Royal Mail said that it had been delivered 15 minutes before. As soon as the other Royal Mail parcel delivery guy saw the blurred photo he said: "they've nicked it". Anyone else had any similar issues?

Are Royal Mail using temporary staff in the run up to Christmas?

[sandyman]

On 16/12/2023 at 14:03, jazzer said:

Gotta say have sent items 2nd class across the SW and they both arrived on time and in perfect condition, so as much as there are concerns about RM's performance, personally they have delivered as per the targets.

However what is a concern is that the Delivery Office behind Forest Hill station have reduced opening hours to two hours a day 8-10am M-F and 8-12 Sat. They seem to be relying on the "newly" introduced automatic next day delivery for missed deliveries. So far I've had one hit and one miss with this.  

I think the problem is largely to do with deliveries to addresses in East Dulwich, not collections in East Dulwich of letters going elsewhere. In fact just to test this out I'm going to post my Christmas cards in the morning to friends all over UK and at the same time i'm going to pop a card in the same letterbox, which I can see from my lounge, to myself. It'll be interesting to see which arrives first...the one from SE22 to Edinburgh or the one from SE22 to SE22...