Dog v postie is no joke as I discovered on my day with the Royal Mail

[TrueBlueTerrier]

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Easy does it: Rhik Samadder helps postal worker Charlie on his run in west London. Photograph: David Levene/Guardian

‘This one will bite the letters and head butt the door,” smiles Charlie, a postal worker I am shadowing on his rounds. He slides a catalogue halfway inside the letterbox of a green door, and it is instantly snatched by jaws unseen. I can tell by the sound that there is drool on the carpet. “Good boy!” I whisper through the door.

I am here to learn about the threat of dogs to postal staff, as part of Royal Mail’s annual drive to raise awareness. Yet not only is my blindly pro-dog prejudice part of the problem, I am too excited to learn anything. I have always been fascinated by the post, with its nostalgic link to national services – even after privatisation, the company has kept its government charter, the universal service obligation to deliver to 30m addresses for the same price.

More than that, though, I am fascinated by the business of being a cheeky postal worker. It is an alternative career I always wondered about. Now I am actually on a round, I can’t stop asking Charlie questions. What’s the most annoying thing to deliver? (The Harrods catalogue: too thick.) Does he ignore signs that say “No junk mail please”? (Yes: it’s not his job to decide what is junk mail or not.) What do his regulars say to him every day? (“One of them says: ‘Morning Postman Pat, where’s your black and white cat?”)

Such a wholesome life, I think, picturing myself with the red bag, the red top, the company trainers with a red stripe on the tongue.

On a nearby patch of grass, I see a handsome boxer, squatting. I beckon the good boy over and we fraternise. “That’s actually against the guidelines,” says Henry Perry, external relations manager for Royal Mail, who is also with us. In dog safety recommendations for staff, the company uses the acronym Avoid, in which the “A” stands for … well, avoid. (The others are Defend, Inform, Observe and Value Yourself, that latter of which sounds quite spiritual, but basically means don’t enter a garden with an unchained cockapoo in it.)

Meeting dogs is one of the top five reasons I like to imagine being a postal worker. Isn’t the eternal rivalry between pooch and postie cute? Somehow very British?

“This Dennis the Menace idea, that a dog hanging off the seat of your pants is an occupational hazard – I have a problem with that,” says Shaun Davis, global safety director at Royal Mail. “It’s like saying: ‘If you don’t want to get held up by a bank robber, don’t work in a bank.’”

It turns out that dog attacks are one of the top five threats to postal staff. Fingers and thumbs have been bitten off, even a nose. Injuries to calves, buttocks and testicles are common. In 2017, there were more than six attacks a day. It’s a country-wide problem: last year, Sheffield saw the highest number of incidents, this year it was Taunton. As Davis describes the life-changing injuries that mean some postal staff are unable to return to their routes, and require much mental health support afterwards, I realise that I have been naive.

“I don’t use postal pegs; they can’t take any weight,” says Charlie, dismissing the tongs staff are encouraged to use to deliver mail through letterboxes. Perry looks sad, because this is not a very on-message thing to say. (Thirteen per cent of dog attacks on postal staff are of the fingers-in-letterbox variety.)

Charlie is exactly what I like to imagine postal workers are like: an unnaturally fast mover, nipping over walls, earbuds hanging over one ear, trying to beat his personal best time for the round. Posties talk a bit like rappers: I ask Charlie where he is from, and he replies: “W7, but we’re in W12 now.” At just 20, he is one of the youngest in the game and, by his calculation, won’t see a good (ie easy) route until he is 40. He is also the least concerned person I have ever met. Inside a terrifying death-trap lift on an estate, he mildly observes that it often breaks down. He steps into the road the way Achilles stepped into battle. “If I waited, nothing would get delivered,” he says over his shoulder as a Ford Focus supplicates before him. Is he concerned about dog bites? He smiles, which I take to mean he is not.

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A postal worker uses VR in a training session. Photograph: Royal Mail

“The ‘young and invincible’ mindset is one of our challenges,” acknowledges Davis. It is why the company has developed a new virtual reality experience, to teach its frontline employees Avoid strategies. It is short and interactive, to better engage staff, who will have been pulled off the sorting floor for the training. I have a go myself later, at Royal Mail’s head office, in a swivel chair with a VR headset on. It’s fun – you get to follow a new postal worker, Mel, on her round, looking for signs of dogs and advising her what to do. I stare at poos hidden in the virtual garden, urine-faded grass, hung up leads and cutesy warning notices, while the program registers that I have clocked them. Occasionally, I misdirect Mel: telling her to feed a begging terrier, or not to bother reporting a new dog on her walk log. Then I am called into the office and reprimanded by a virtual manager.


Royal Mail’s dog-awareness campaign has been a success. It’s not anti-dog; it simply advocates for responsible dog ownership, and the public have responded. Simple tips – such as securing excitable dogs in other rooms at delivery hour, and fitting letterbox cages or external post boxes, have halved the 5,000 annual dog attacks of just five years ago.

Approaching the end of the round, which I have slowed down immeasurably, I figure the time is now. Swallowing nervously, I ask if I can put one in.

“Put one … what in?” asks Charlie, breaking stride for the first time. I explain that one of my lifelong ambitions has been to become a postie and deliver the mail. Charlie shrugs and hands me a bundle.

“That’s definitely against USO guidelines,” Perry shouts, but he’s too far behind, and too late. It’s happening. I shove in a Boden catalogue, a penalty charge notification and some final demands. It’s a little underwhelming, to be honest. Post has got less interesting since the internet. Still, it is satisfying to tick off the bucket list; now all I need is to try becoming a town crier, and go hang-gliding. And get a dog.

[crimson king]

"Nipping over walls and trying to beat their personal best times"....

What a crock of crap that article is. Starts off well, leads you to believe it might be a serious piece about a serious problem that affects us on a daily basis, descends into pale Carry On style humour ("can I put one in?") and concludes by trivialising our very job.

Our job might be "underwhelming" and "less interesting since the Internet", but it beats the crap out of those crappy journalistic skills.