How much Special Delivery items are arriving late and what's going on with it.

[Matt Special]

I both send and receive frequent (about 4 a week) Special delivery items with my work and in six years one item arrived late until the last month when four I have sent have been late and three I was supposed to receive.

Am I being incredibly unlucky or are lots of Special Delivery items being delayed and if so what is causing it.

[TrueBlueTerrier]

I will have to be careful here being a serving postie, but I would suggest checking out the threads about our CEOs being called to Parliament twice. That hopefully will give you some insight as to what is going on in Royal Mail at the moment.

[Navalron]

I both send and receive frequent (about 4 a week) Special delivery items with my work and in six years one item arrived late until the last month when four I have sent have been late and three I was supposed to receive.

Am I being incredibly unlucky or are lots of Special Delivery items being delayed and if so what is causing it.

Well I'm ex Royal Mail. It's because it's a s**t show at the moment. The management are putting intolerable work loads onto postal staff. Also there making them leave mail in the office and concentrate on parcel deliverys. There also not hiring enough staff because they say there skint. Bullshit, they gave it all away to shareholders. Posture walk an average of 11.7 miles per day and deliver to approximately 978 addresses, so even more. They have taken a great public service and f****d it up all for a buck. That's why your not getting a good service because your letter is not making enough money for them so they don't want to know. Sad but true.

[Matt Special]

…. your letter is not making enough money for them so they don't want to know.

These were sent special delivery and when they arrive late I get a no quibble refund from Royal Mail. For example yesterday I send a parcel via Special delivery and it's late so I'm going to get a full refund for the postage which was over £15. I would have thought Royal Mail would have been trying to get these delivered on time.

[TrueBlueTerrier]

…. your letter is not making enough money for them so they don't want to know.

These were sent special delivery and when they arrive late I get a no quibble refund from Royal Mail. For example yesterday I send a parcel via Special delivery and it's late so I'm going to get a full refund for the postage which was over £15. I would have thought Royal Mail would have been trying to get these delivered on time.

We as posties certainly would.

However, the ultimate intention of Share Holders and the board may not not align with such an ideal

[simmo11]

A decision has probably been taken at high level that it's cheaper to pay a certain number of claims than resource the service properly.

[Matt Special]

However, the ultimate intention of Share Holders and the board may not not align with such an ideal

I've been asking around regarding this a lot and I've only got cryptic answers so forgive me for being so direct. But, are you saying Royal Mail are sabotaging themselves where non business mail is involved possibly in an attempt to get out of service obligations and get the government to take over -at cost to the tax payer- delivery of personal mail?

[fb1969]

It is the delivery of letters that RM want to get rid of, they simply do not care about them. The CEO in an interview a few months back said something along the lines of "we are now a parcels company, we used to be a letters company" which totally ignored the legal obligation to deliver letters.

I left RM last year, the office I worked in is now carrying 19 vacancies out of a full staffing level of around 95 - so a 20% gap in the number of people there should be. There has been no recruitment in the office for over a year. That office also has around 25% of the remaining staff working their day off every week because the posties know that if they take their rest day, they will face a double workload the next day. While they get overtime for doing that, it also means extra wear and tear on their body with another 10 miles or so to walk. That in turn can lead to time off sick, which leads to more gaps in the staffing levels - my old office has 8 people on long term sick, so the 95 required is down to under 70 people.

[SpacePhoenix]

I left RM last year, the office I worked in is now carrying 19 vacancies out of a full staffing level of around 95 - so a 20% gap in the number of people there should be. There has been no recruitment in the office for over a year. That office also has around 25% of the remaining staff working their day off every week because the posties know that if they take their rest day, they will face a double workload the next day. While they get overtime for doing that, it also means extra wear and tear on their body with another 10 miles or so to walk. That in turn can lead to time off sick, which leads to more gaps in the staffing levels - my old office has 8 people on long term sick, so the 95 required is down to under 70 people.

Why would they get more staff when they're getting it covered by people working their day off and those doing OT.

[fb1969]

.

[fb1969]

Why would they get more staff when they're getting it covered by people working their day off and those doing OT.

Posted by someone who doesn't know what goes on in a Delivery Office. You make it sound like the posties are responsible for the under manning.

RM have had no intention of recruiting people, despite all the shortages there are currently around 20 vacancies being advertised across the whole of the UK. Going back a few years (before covid gave RM the headstart on destroying the service) the number of people working their day off was in single figures - most of the time there was no requirement to do so as the office was properly staffed. People have only started doing so because RM have practically removed all day off cover staff, so if they don't work their day off they get hit with double the next day.

And on top of that, the office is currently in the list of the "offices in trouble". Despite the number of people working their day off, at least 33% of the duties have been failing on a daily basis for the last few weeks. So people working their day off on overtime isn't even covering the cracks.

[SpacePhoenix]

Why would they get more staff when they're getting it covered by people working their day off and those doing OT.

Posted by someone who doesn't know what goes on in a Delivery Office. You make it sound like the posties are responsible for the under manning.

RM have had no intention of recruiting people, despite all the shortages there are currently around 20 vacancies being advertised across the whole of the UK. Going back a few years (before covid gave RM the headstart on destroying the service) the number of people working their day off was in single figures - most of the time there was no requirement to do so as the office was properly staffed. People have only started doing so because RM have practically removed all day off cover staff, so if they don't work their day off they get hit with double the next day.

And on top of that, the office is currently in the list of the "offices in trouble". Despite the number of people working their day off, at least 33% of the duties have been failing on a daily basis for the last few weeks. So people working their day off on overtime isn't even covering the cracks.

Why don't they just cut off? If they follow the correct cut-off procedure, it's the manager's problem then

[fb1969]

Why don't they just cut off? If they follow the correct cut-off procedure, it's the manager's problem then

They are cutting off!!!!! You really are clueless. The office is failing massively on a daily basis. Overtime is allowed for working day off, but has been pretty much stopped for going over anyway. That is why the office is failing.

I have never posted about life in a mail centre but you continue to make inane comments about Delivery Offices when you know nothing about them other than a few buzzwords.

And whether it is or isn't the manager's problem, the original post was asking whether RM as a company are binning the basics of delivering mail. My original post was giving the OP several examples of what RM are doing. Your contribution to the thread has been mainly to point the blame at posties.

[SpacePhoenix]

Why don't they just cut off? If they follow the correct cut-off procedure, it's the manager's problem then

They are cutting off!!!!! You really are clueless. The office is failing massively on a daily basis. Overtime is allowed for working day off, but has been pretty much stopped for going over anyway. That is why the office is failing.

I have never posted about life in a mail centre but you continue to make inane comments about Delivery Offices when you know nothing about them other than a few buzzwords.

And whether it is or isn't the manager's problem, the original post was asking whether RM as a company are binning the basics of delivering mail. My original post was giving the OP several examples of what RM are doing. Your contribution to the thread has been mainly to point the blame at posties.

Well if you'd said in your post that they were cutting off then I'd have known and wouldn't have need to post about them needing to cut off

[fb1969]

Well if you'd said in your post that they were cutting off then I'd have known and wouldn't have need to post about them needing to cut off

? Your ignorance knows no bounds.

If you knew what you were talking about then you wouldn't have needed to have posted at all.