The Mother & Baby magazine ordered by dad Paul Edwards finally arrived, a whopping 19 years after he actually bought it – an amused Mr Edwards said the late arrival ‘tickled’ him
A dad was stunned to finally receive a magazine in the post 19 years after he actually bought it.
Paul Edwards, 52, was awaiting the arrival of his son in 2007 when he bought a copy of Mother & Baby magazine. His daughter was 18 months old at the time. Now, his children are now aged 18 and 20 and at university.
“Like a lot of relatively new parents, you sign up for subscriptions for things to give you advice, offers and provide things to do with the children – then obviously everyone realises you have to work it out for yourself,” Mr Edwards told the BBC, calling the experience “really bizarre”.
“I’m not sure we realised at the time that the magazine was missing. Then it’s suddenly arrived in the post. You get a half-torn screwed up bag and you think, ‘what on Earth is this’, with the ‘sincere apologies’ on it.”
The magazine finally arrived last Friday with a note from the Royal Mail that said it apologised for “any inconvenience caused”. It is less likely the magazine was lost by the Royal Mail, which said it checks its dorting machines and delivery offices every day. It was more likely that the item was put back into the postal system by someone.
Mr Edwards, an author, said he had been rushing to the door to find out about potential publishing deals when he was suddenly given the magazine through his letter box. “It just really tickled me – it’s the contradiction,” he said.
“You’re constantly checking for any publishing offer then this turns up. It’s just marvellous. What really got me was the ‘apologies for the inconvenience’. My two children have now left home.”
It comes as OFCOM as opened an investigation into Royal Mail’s failure to meet its delivery targets for the last year, it has said. Under the watchdog’s targets, 90 percent of first-class mail should be delivered the next day, and 95% of second-class mail should be delivered within three days.
But Royal Mail announced last week that it had missed targets for another year running, achieving 75.7 percent of first-class mail arriving the next working day over the 12 months to the end of March, according to the latest quality of service report. This was slightly less than the 76.3 percent achieved the prior year.
For second-class mail, 90.2 percent was delivered within three working days – less than the 92.2 percent achieved the year before. Last July, OFCOM “modernised” obligations placed on Royal Mail to reflect steep declines in the number of letters being sent, allowing second-class letters to be delivered on alternate weekdays among changes to delivery targets.
Royal Mail expected to complete it rollout of the new delivery model by Christmas, OFCOM said. While Royal Mail was now making progress, it had taken almost a year to begin the process of implementing the delivery reforms and service levels remained unacceptable, the regulator added.
OFCOM enforcement director Ian Strawhorne said: “A reliable postal service is vital to many people across the country. We share the deep frustrations of customers who have missed important letters because of Royal Mail’s consistent failure to improve its service over the years. While the company is now making progress through its improvement plan, we will continue to hold it to account for its unacceptable performance to date.”
A Royal Mail spokesman said: “Improving quality of service is a top priority and we are delivering a major programme of change through the rollout of our new delivery model which underpins our Improvement Plan, backed by £500 million of investment over five years. These reforms are designed to deliver long-term quality improvements for customers as we modernise the postal service and deploy the new delivery model, enabled by the changes to the Universal Service regulations that OFCOM introduced in July 2025.
“At a time when significant investment is being made to improve reliability across the network, any financial penalty would reduce funding that could otherwise be used to support service improvements for customers. We will engage fully with OFCOM throughout their investigation.”