Nick Landon : Here's some updates on what's happening with our customers this week.

[POSTMAN]

First: It's official; Santa Mail is now live and kids all over the country can write to Santa and we'll deliver his reply. With everything that's been going on in the world over the last two years this is a fantastic way to cheer up all the kids in the UK and to build a positive connection with letters and Royal Mail that will last for a lifetime. Royal Mail is amazing all year round of course but for many of our consumer customers this is the time of year that we shine, so thank you in advance for everything you'll do this year to make the UK's Children smile.

Second: You will all have seen reports on the TV and in the press that people should order early for Christmas because it's going to be so busy. We can really see that in our sales team where new customer wins are really flying. In one week we won over £20m of new contract customer business with very few losses to our competitors. Customers are voting with their feet for Royal Mail this Christmas so keep doing what you're doing everyone. It's working.

And finally; as you would expect at this time of year I'm spending lots of time with our biggest customers as they get ready for Black Friday and Christmas. Achim and I met with Amazon last week who will be relying on us again to deliver a big slice of their parcels with the great quality they have come to expect from us. And tomorrow Simon and I will be meeting The Very Group at our new hub in Daventry to show them how we are investing in the future and to talk about how we will be looking after all of their customers this year. Every big customer has choices about who they give their parcels to. We have to earn the right to keep getting them from our biggest customers every day and even more so at Christmas when we deliver more presents to the UK than anyone else. Thank you in again for everything you will do to help us keep on growing this Christmas and into next year.

Chief Commercial Officer at Royal Mail Group

[POSTMAN]

Each weekend I update the rest of the Exec Board on what's happening in the world of Royal Mail Commercial and what it means for the weeks and months ahead.

It would be really useful to get your feedback on what we're doing too. Here's a few topics to get you started.

1: We're about to launch photos on delivery for our first customer this week and we want to roll it out to many more as soon as possible. Our sending customers really want this as they see it as incontrovertible evidence of delivery and for us it could really help reduce denial of receipt complaints. What do you think?

2: Later this month we'll be introducing the option for us to bring the posting label when we collect a parcel through Parcel Collect. Customers tell us this is the number one reason they don't buy postage from us on line and get us to collect it today so we expect this to be a big help in growing the service faster. What do you think?

3: As we put barcodes on more and more letters and parcels it's enabling us to get even better at making sure we're fairly paid for everything we do. Our Revenue Protection team are having a fantastic year and are consistently beating their budget. By using real data collected by all of you we are helping customers to clearly see what they need to do differently to help us, and we are squeezing out fraudsters by giving them nowhere to hide. This is just one of the reasons why it's really important to scan all of our items correctly. What do you think?

We have loads of great things happening with customers in the run up to Christmas too. See 1st post.

Chief Commercial Officer at Royal Mail Group

[no1postie]

ok nick.

[hans solo]

deliver santas reply in january like last year

[fb1969]

Hope you've had a good wank over that lot Nick. You are several hundred miles from the reality of the situation.

And a quick answer to number 3. Why is it that when I show a manager that a sender has used the same barcode for two separate items, they don't give a s**t?

[max49]

Oh dear, I do hope we have the equipment, like vans, posties and PDAs in order to fulfil these contracts. The left hand in this company doesn't seem to know what's happening in the right hand.

[clashcityrocker]

What do I think?
I think a lot of people are pissed off with the really piss poor service we are providing after our structured revision.

[smok3y666]

I'll give you an update for our customers this week, they've not been recieving their mail or packets for most of it. Well done.

[smok3y666]

What do I think?
I think a lot of people are pissed off with the really piss poor service we are providing after our structured revision.

Structured? What was structured about it? The guy who did ours did a "best guess" and has now disappeared.

[Wolf91]

This guy is just one of the worst.

[Phantom]

Even more bollocks!!!

Get more staff in Delivery or YOU will fail!

[Mr Rush]

Achim and I met with Amazon last week who will be relying on us again to deliver a big slice of their parcels with the great quality they have come to expect from us.

Can we please offload our overflow onto someone else? Either Amazon operates a vertically-integrated end-to-end delivery service or it is a retailer that can utilise whichever commercial delivery service it so chooses. Pick one.

[fb1969]

I wonder how much we actually make from delivering Amazon parcels if you allow for the costs of compensating them and others when we cannot deliver everything because we are swamped by them.

[blacov]

I read all these posts and I sometimes wonder what senior managers/directors think when they see not one, not two but dozens of topics, possibly accounting for hundreds of posts saying the very same thing. We are failing to deliver the very basic service people want and pay for. They must be so proud of themselves. Patting each others backs in a boardroom, we are ready to launch a new product, we did a huge progress on revisions. At the same time ignoring serious warnings from people who actually do the job on the street level. Royal Mail have feet of clay.