bye bye Royal Mail.......

Picture the scene in homes up & down the country every January:

"Ok, we can either have a family holiday or we can send Granny a card that might just reach her via Murdoch SkyPost in time for Christmas. The cost is roughly the same....."

 

It's been getting fattened up for some time, high charges and low cap investment produce artificially high profits.

 

And when the new organisation takes over, watch how much mail goes missing or never arrives.........particularly for people and business in rural areas where the low popultion density makes it uneconomical to deliver low volume mail.

I can see it ending up like Gas, Water & Electricity where there are about ten different tariffs (from each postal organisation), with each one resulting in confusion, hidden charges etc etc.....


.............and somewhere someone said email was on the way out..........All I can say is that email has proved to be a 'kin sight more reliable than the Post Office.

AL

 

It will be a shame as costs to deliver will be passed onto the consumer. No matter how much t'internet has helped to drive prices down through competition, you still have to ship physical goods to the consumer!

I must admit that I'm surprised that postal costs have stayed so low for so long, and price rises are inevitable if Royal Mail was to stop swallowing huge amounts of money from the Government to keep it rolling, but I also fear that once in private hands the key focus will be making money for investors regardless of quality of service. As you say, it didn't work for trains, gas, water, electricity, the NHS...

Luckily there are already a lot of small couriers who are as competitive, if not cheaper, than Royal Mail / Parcel Farce in certain areas, so hopefully these guys can up their game and compete.

Hopefully it will stop them putting tons of junk mail through my door with the post as well!

 

whats wrong with the govt supporting tho? Why do all these public institutions have to make lots of profits? Where will it stop - police having to generate their own income to pay for patrols and overtime...oh no hold on, that happens now. Yep the time of greater good will finally be totally swallowed by the coming tide of greed

 

At one stage and maybe still, Suffolk Plod had a 'Business Development Manager'...................WTF?

 

I worked for the AA before where I am now, and the forces' procurement is mostly led these days around referral fees and passing on cost to others where it can.

 

Well there goes my plans for my career later on in life. I was going to become a post man.

 

Nothing, IMO, and that's exactly the kind of service the Government should own/control/run and at a loss if needs be.

 

Hmmmmmmmmm - Really?
Public sector works does it?

Sadly greed and personal profit is the greatest motivator and not good will to one's fellow man.

 

Snap! Early start, only pressure being getting around in time, keeping fit and on the bike by mid afternoon

 

The staff at RM are their own worst enemy. They went on strike a few years back and businesses all over the country suffered. We didn't receive cheques from customers on time, suppliers were paid late. It caused me massive headaches. At that point me, my customers, and my suppliers all took the same decision, send invoices via email, and pay each other electronically. We all needed to do it. It was long overdue, but if it hadn't been for a series of strikes then we probably wouldn't have changed something that wasn't broken. It's a great example of staff not seeing the bigger picture and thinking about short term gains.

If it hadn't been for the large amount of packages being sent due to e-retail and ebay then I think they would be in an even worse state that present.

 

I`m not making an argument for or against privatisation here but just pointing out that any state owned operation that makes a loss is subsidised by the money we pay in tax as the government doesn't actually have any of their own, they take ours. That means that if the Royal Mail makes a loss we all chip in regardless of we choose to use the service or not. If it is private then you can agree to pay whatever the charges are, not send anything or use an alternative provider.

 

Remember British Rail.........................

and British Gas and British Telecom and...................

 

And some services should be supplied by the state and therefore the tax payer. Simple letter delivery service, access to straightforward and inexpensive parcel delivery imho are two that should. Along with a functioning NHS, education, a form of citizen protection both home and interests abroad, right and supported means to defend yourself against accusation of wrongdoing and a few others I'm sure

 

I fear this is exactly where they'll be making their profits once in the hands of the private sector money making machine. Expect more unwanted advertising shit through your letterbox!

 

I have a policy with junk mail, I hoard it all up, and the one that pisses me off the most in a given month I send it to them in a jiffy weighted down with some nice stones and other heavy rubbish. I just drop it in the post box so they have to pay to receive it at the other end, and I send them a nice card saying how much I enjoyed their junk mail.

small things...

 

I use Royal Mail all the time.
I buy and sell stupid little things or small vintage items it helps me out sometime.
I used to happily sell away no problems.
The they bumped the charges right up and introduced that slot thing so £2.80 package was costing £5.60!
Talk about slump !! can't sell hardly anything and now everyone wants to collect which is a pain in the butt as they mess about a lot!
I send most items in 6X6x6 boxes to get round that now BUT i know have to pay more for those boxes
Great.
Oh the slot thing where it used to have to fall through freely they got sp many angry complaints at the faff you know can push it through the slot with a bit of force .... so if they try and say it wont go through free fall point this out .
Also they have a box for the 6x6x6 cube packages some try and charge you 5.60! say no can you pop it in the cube please .
£3.00.
The amount of stuff I have had messed up and broken is couriers is a joke !
My cousins have good jobs at Royal snail...