New competition to put RM out of business:Evri and DHL UK merger to deliver stronger Royal Mail rival

[Idk]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwywd2wzxp2o

Couriers Evri and DHL merge to form UK delivery giant

Evri will merge with DHL's UK parcel delivery business to create a combined courier firm handling more than a billion parcels and a billion letters a year.

DHL focuses on faster, secure higher-value deliveries of items such as computers or phones, whereas Evri handles much larger volumes of lower-value goods such as clothing.

Evri's deliveries are handled by self-employed couriers using their own vehicles, while DHL's parcels are delivered by a combination of couriers and the company's own fleet of vehicles.

The companies hope that combining the two operations will offer "greater choice" and "cost-competitive solutions" in the UK.

Evri said the deal will also expand its international delivery capacity by giving it access to DHL's global network.

DHL's e-commerce business will be renamed "Evri Premium – a network of DHL eCommerce".

DHL delivers a billion letters a year in the UK, mainly for businesses sending out bulk mail to clients – and the merger will see Evri offer a letter service for the first time.

It hopes to use this service to handle deliveries of smaller items as well as letters.

The group said its combined operation will have access to a network of 15,000 out-of-home delivery points in shops and lockers.

With about a billion parcels a year, the merged business would get closer to Royal Mail's parcel volumes. It delivered 1.3 billion parcels and 6.7 billion letters last year, according to its annual report.

Martijn de Lange, the chief executive of Evri, said that over the last decade Evri had "grown ten-fold in size".

He added the merger would "further expand our access into the European and global e-commerce markets".

After the merger DHL will acquire a minority stake in Evri - financial terms have not been disclosed.

DHL's other services in the UK, such as the DHL Express international delivery service are not included in the deal.

The merger is still subject to approval from the Competition and Markets Authority.

[tramssirhc]

Renationalisation now! The industry is becoming a monopoly.

[Jefferson Starfish]

Renationalisation now! The industry is becoming a monopoly.

You mean like the one RM used to have before competition was allowed?

[pinstripe]

Do DHL actually, physically deliver letters, or are they dumped on RM?

[Alfietherat]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwywd2wzxp2o

Race to the Bottom- Ready, Steady, Go!

[datasaint]

Interesting times.

These companies are rapidly catching up and chipping away at RM's lead in the sector.

The trouble is they can do it for less than RM can, so what has to give? Employees will ultimately suffer.

[richietns]

Renationalisation now! The industry is becoming a monopoly.

You mean like the one RM used to have before competition was allowed?

The difference is RM was letter infrastructure (uso) ever since "competition"the service has been destroyed.

[ted_e_bear]

So they decided to name a product

Evri Premium

I'm sure there's a name for such a figure of speech

[enskied]

While we RM are racing to the bottom to drop our standards and procedures, the "competition" are upping their game. Ironic.

[oypostie]

Do DHL actually, physically deliver letters, or are they dumped on RM?

No they don't. Their website makes it clear that they're the middle man between the customer and Royal Mail. DSA parasites

[Mr Rush]

The parcels market is fairly overcrowded so I expected an operator to drop out or a merger to occur eventually.

[fitz15]

Competitions and market authority should block this going through.

[datasaint]

Competitions and market authority should block this going through.

Unlikely, Royal Mail still has a bigger market share.

[NWpostie]

Do DHL actually, physically deliver letters, or are they dumped on RM?

No they don't. Their website makes it clear that they're the middle man between the customer and Royal Mail. DSA parasites

As RM becomes a delisted private company it can charge full market rates for DSA.

[postslippete]

This is a strange one as the two companies have completely different business models. Evri is the gig economy, self-employed one while DHL are similar to us with employed drivers. Which one business model do you think that they will lean to?

And what will it mean for us as we are the cusp of another pay deal? Parcels are where the money is and this merger threatens RM's edge and possible market share as the combined operation will be close to RM's 1.3 billion parcels per year. It's potentially bad news for workers pay, rights and conditions across the board but obviously good for shareholders and businesses with lower costs and more delivery options. Obviously, it will need to be approved by the CMA but they won't see it as anti-competitive because neither of them deliver letters at any scale.

Sadly, these delivery companies are just competing on how cheaply they can squeeze labour and RM will see it as a threat. This gives our management even more ammunition to accelerate their race to the bottom, chip away at working conditions and claim that they are just keeping with the rest of the delivery sector. We have a dozen new starts beginning next week and RM's long term goals seem pretty clear to me - they want to gradually push legacy staff out or wear them down and they want more new starters on worse contracts with lower wages and more flexibility. Evri couriers don't even get sick pay and our Union is trying to improve ours. If the CWU doesn't hold firm then we will end up with worse rotas, less job security and more pressure to flex just like these glorified door-steppers.