Parcels Please and Royal Mail Strikes
Firstly, Parcels Please uses the Parcel Carrier networks of Interlink Express (DPD) and UPS. No parcels booked on any parcels please service are carried through either the Royal Mail or Parcelforce.
Therefore, you can be 100% assured that Royal Mail strike action, on either a national or local basis, will not result in any delays to any parcel deliveries booked online with Parcels Please.
To talk to us about moving your mail deliveries over onto our parcel network systems please use our Parcels Please contact form.
Strike Action Planned by Royal Mail Workers;
Strikes planned for Friday 6th November and Monday 9th November have now been called off. The CWU and the Royal Mail are in negotiations and although a final agreement has yet to be reached, the CWU have agreed to halt strike action for the remainder of this year.
The Modernisation program at the crux of the strike, is a long term issue for the Royal Mail, and in fact postal companies all over the world. At the begining of November Deutsche Post struck and agreement with German Postal Unions regarding very similar issues.
The general underlying problem that the mail industry is facing is that mail volumes are declining rapidly. The brown envelope statements, bills and cheques that were the bread and butter of the mail industry are fast being replaced by emails, online banking and account management for utilities, and payments via direct debits and electronic banking. Companies that would send out monthly payment runs of hundreds of cheque now use so few cheques that the banking industry is considering withdrawing cheques completely.
The other main influence in the declining volumes of mail is the opening up of the parcel and mail markets to commercial companies. Most parcel companies now offer parcel services that are cheaper than the Royal Mail, so despite a growing parcel delivery market caused by the growth of e-commerce, the Royal Mail is still loosing volume in this segment.
Much of the Royal Mail’s mail sorting network is based on old town centre local mail depots, and part of the modernisation program is about bring the mail sorting practises up to modern standards, using state of the art equipment. Most of the buildings the Royal Mail currently use are unsuitable for this, therefore part of the plan is for new mail “superhubs”, that will be located more strategically for logistics purposees, not buried in city centre one way systems, but located out of town, near to major motorways. The first of these is already in action at Daventry.
The mail workers are concerned because the current proposals look to indicate that up to 25% of mail worker jobs will be lost through the modernisation program, and that many of those that are left will be required to travel much further to work.
The Royal Mail know that unless they face these issues head on, then the Royal Mail will be unable to work within the profit expectations of the government. And will face increasing pressures for privatisation.
All of these issues are long term strategic issues for the Royal Mail, and although the CWU have called off their current bought of strikes, it is these exact same issues that caused the strikes back in 2007. And until the Royal Mail manages to build a long term strategy, that the mail workers fully buy into, businesses need to prepare themselves for the fact that periodic, and in particular regional, strikes and distruption are going to be par for the course for the next few years.
