After many years of missing letter delivery targets – during which time stamp prices have soared – Royal Mail promises to finally get a grip of the problem through major investment
Royal Mail has vowed to finally meet its letter delivery targets by next May as part of a £500million turnaround.
The privatised postal giant will also offer part-time postal workers the option to do longer hours in an effort to improve its service.
The changes follows agreement with the Communication Workers Union (CWU) last week, bringing an end to a lengthy dispute over the second-class post overhaul. The group will begin to phase in a new letter delivery model nationwide next month.
The changes will mean it axes Saturday second class deliveries and moves to alternate weekdays – three days one week, and two days the next.
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Royal Mail said the changes and planned investment will see it improve first class next day delivery to around 85% within nine months of the reforms being brought in, before reaching the 90% target set by regulator Ofcom within a year.
The firm also vowed to deliver 93% of second-class letters in three days within the space of nine months, and hit the 95% target by May next year.
Royal Mail – whose owner International Distribution Services was bought last year by Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky – was fined a record £21 million by Ofcom in October for missing targets after it delivered just 77% of first-class post and 92.5% of second-class post on time in 2024-25.
From April 1, Ofcom lowered the delivery targets for first class post to be delivered the next day from 93% to 90% and second-class to be delivered within three days from 98.5% to 95%.
But Ofcom added a new “enforceable” backstop delivery target, so that 99% of mail has to be delivered no more than two days late.
Royal Mail said its £500 million investment in the service over the next five years included an agreement to allow around 6,000 part-time postal workers to increase their average weekly hours if needed as part of the second-class post reforms.
It will be funded by savings made from the changes to the Universal Service.
The missed targets come as customers have seen stamp prices soar. The price of a first class stamp jumped by another 10p to £1.80 on April 7. The price of a second class stamp will rise by 4p to 91p.
Mr Kretinsky last month apologised for the postal giant’s late deliveries – but denied it was getting worse.
He told MPs: “Of course I am deeply sorry for any letters that arrive late.” However, he insisted: “It is not perfect, but it is not catastrophic.”
Alistair Cochrane, chief executive of Royal Mail, said: “We recognise our service hasn’t always been the standard our customers rightly expect and we’re determined to do better.
“The plan we’ve set out today shows how we’ll make a step change in performance across the UK, backed by £500 million of investment over the next five years.”
It comes after Ofcom said it had been pushing for a “credible plan for change, backed by investment”.
Natalie Black, Ofcom’s group director for infrastructure and connectivity, said: “Now that’s published, Royal Mail needs to get on and implement it.
“Their plan must deliver significant and continuous improvement, with performance getting back on track.”
Ofcom last year gave the green light to Royal Mail’s plans to scale back second-class letter deliveries, starting from July 28, while keeping the first-class and parcels service unchanged.
Royal Mail launched the changes across 35 delivery offices as a pilot, but wider expansion across its 1,200-strong network ground to a halt over the disagreement with the CWU.
The agreement reached last week, which is now being put to CWU members for a ballot, will see the Universal Service reforms extended to another 240 delivery offices initially, before being completed across the full network by December.
Dave Ward, general secretary of the CWU, said: “We welcome any serious proposal that seeks to reverse customer service failings at Royal Mail, but what really matters is what happens on the ground to make that change happen.
He said postal workers “need answers over whether the workforce will be properly resourced and retained, whether they will have a real say over how change is deployed, what manageable workloads look like, and how serious issues are fixed”.
