The first Saturday in September sees Royal Mail extend its services – in the first sign that the newly privatised business is prepared to concentrate on profitable services rather than provide a national service for all. If Auntie Flo in Orkney posts you a new bed jacket she’s knitted you, the chances are you will be able to pick it up from the Royal Mail delivery office on a Sunday. If you send her some chocolates back as a thank you, she’ll have to wait till Monday if she misses the Saturday opening hours.
These are the new activities Royal Mail is taking on.
•They will begin a trial of Sunday deliveries to addresses within the M25 motorway.
•Royal Mail has some 1,400 delivery offices, which are currently open six days a week. Opening hours will be extended at the 100 delivery offices with the highest parcels volumes across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, covering seven days a week. There will be ten delivery offices open across London between 12 noon and 4pm: Battersea, Croydon, Dagenham, Enfield, Harrow, Islington, Kingston upon Thames and Surbiton, Stoke Newington, Walthamstow and Whitechapel. The initiative is designed to make it easier for online shoppers not at home during the day to get their parcels.
Royal Mail dresses all this up as “part of an on-going programme by Royal Mail to be more customer responsive and provide more options for people to receive items they have ordered online.” While many of us will appreciate being able to collect parcels on a Sunday, extra services should be “extra” not “instead of”. Things can only get worse.