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Our glorious postal service
cfgs
Posts: 11,487
You now need a second mortgage to send a large birthday card first class, but most addresses no longer get more than one or two deliveries a week. So what is the point? I live in a small town, but we have our own sorting office so no excuse really, as a country we just accept mediocrity with a polite shrug.
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Privatisation. Without fail leads to a worsening of the product and a price hike.26
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Its a race to the bottom1
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Yes I'm in Greenwich & we seem to get 1 delivery a week & then the bastard postie bends our post in half, even birthday cards etc even though the letter box is clearly big enough to accept most mail.0
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This is the first year i have posted birthday cards first class 2 days before to a rural address in Warwickshire and they havent arrived in time. Definitely more expensive for a far worse service1
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I allow a week for first class birthday cards to arrive and still some have not been delivered on time.0
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The game here is not to post one with an actual age on it just in case it is a year late20
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Ofcom isn't fit for purpose, they allowed Royal Mail to reduce 2nd class deliveries, but are letting them get away with a more reduced service than agreed.
We're lucky if we get 2 deliveries a week now. They are still supposed to deliver the majority of 1st class mail the next day, but they don't bother unless there is a parcel to deliver as well.
Royal Mail is now foreign owned so should lose the Royal part of the name.
Any fines that Ofcom impose will probably be less than the money they save by not delivering on time.
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Valley Gold and Compulsory ID cards get first class priority.3
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Vicious circle-
People use the post less (email/texts etc) - full service cant be maintained - people use lesser service less- service degraded to save costs- people use service less etc5 -
What a surprise, it all went to shit when it was privatised. All worth it though as a poster on here made a few hundred quid.2
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Yeah, if only the private sector were as efficient and successful as government-run concerns
The whole country’s going to the dogs quicker than you can say, “five hundred in, six out” irrespective of what circus is running it, public or private5 -
I got a letter from HMRC last week dated 09/07/25.
I'm not sure who is the most likely culprit.2 -
Thing that pisses me off is that the last collection at most of the post boxes where I live is first thing in the morning, so you have to add on another day to the delivery time unless you take it all the way to the post office.6
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It's perfectly simple.
2nd class mail is as below, but remember last collection may be next morning, it may be in the evening, but sometimes those collections are made early if the Postie wants to finish early, so again that start point shifts to the next day. At the sorting office there may be further delays due to staff shortages and student labour. The other problem is the Mon/Wed/Thu routine which could be swapped to the Tues/Thurs routine in times of stress and confusion.
Maybe send a text?
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Post a birthday card to Cyprus or France it’s £3.20. From Cyprus to UK it’s about 70 cents.
I just don’t get that. Surely there is more work involved this end when a card is received into the UK, ie an actual postie delivering it. Sorting costs must be the same whether sent or received and likewise transport costs.0 -
Letters are the last priorities and often get brought back to, or left in the office because the focus is getting the tracked mail (recorded or whatever it’s called) delivered by 1pm and parcels.
If rounds can’t be covered by the usual postie because of leave, sickness or staff shortages, the managers get other posties to prioritise the tracked and parcels on that round, before letters on their own.
Dont blame the people posting them through a week late. The majority walk and carry up to 9 or 10 miles a day. And that’s after spending 3-4 hrs on their feet in the office sorting the mail up.9 -
It’s getting so expensive it can only be a matter of time before this Labour government adds VAT to the cost of a stamp because only rich people can afford to send mail.cfgs said:You now need a second mortgage to send a large birthday card first class, but most addresses no longer get more than one or two deliveries a week. So what is the point? I live in a small town, but we have our own sorting office so no excuse really, as a country we just accept mediocrity with a polite shrug.1 -
Hard agree here matepaulbaconsarnie said:Letters are the last priorities and often get brought back to, or left in the office because the focus is getting the tracked mail (recorded or whatever it’s called) delivered by 1pm and parcels.
If rounds can’t be covered by the usual postie because of leave, sickness or staff shortages, the managers get other posties to prioritise the tracked and parcels on that round, before letters on their own.
Dont blame the people posting them through a week late. The majority walk and carry up to 9 or 10 miles a day. And that’s after spending 3-4 hrs on their feet in the office sorting the mail up.
Postal staff have long been the victims of some truly atrocious management. I'm not talking about the depot managers here but the abominable senior management.
The management want a nosedive to the bottom, knowing the cost of everything and the value of nothing. Sounds familiar doesnt it
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Weekly post has meant I’ve missed hospital appointments in the past. Thankfully the NHS is now in the 21st century and can send emails text messages and even have an app that works quite well.4
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US date format? 😉😆Covered End said:I got a letter from HMRC last week dated 09/07/25.
I'm not sure who is the most likely culprit.1 -
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25/09/2007, even worse! 😉valleynick66 said:
US date format? 😉😆Covered End said:I got a letter from HMRC last week dated 09/07/25.
I'm not sure who is the most likely culprit.0 -
Let's say you are posting 100 Christmas cards, 1st class. That would cost you £170.
Alternatively you could fly to Serbia from London Luton for £33 return and spend £78 on posting the cards.*
* According to AI.11 -
Thanks for this, seriously. I could take our Xmas cards with us when we visit friends in Cyprus next week, get them to post them, save ourselves a packet. Now where did I put those cards ......cafcfan said:Let's say you are posting 100 Christmas cards, 1st class. That would cost you £170.
Alternatively you could fly to Serbia from London Luton for £33 return and spend £78 on posting the cards.*
* According to AI.2 -
I'm waiting for a ballot paper which hasn't arrived yet. Now it is going to be too late for the ballot. The union seem to be aware, as sending out comms about it0
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I would never blame the postal workers they are victims of corporate greed which prioritises profit over service. Our postie is brilliant and I feel very sorry for him and his colleagues.paulbaconsarnie said:Letters are the last priorities and often get brought back to, or left in the office because the focus is getting the tracked mail (recorded or whatever it’s called) delivered by 1pm and parcels.
If rounds can’t be covered by the usual postie because of leave, sickness or staff shortages, the managers get other posties to prioritise the tracked and parcels on that round, before letters on their own.
Dont blame the people posting them through a week late. The majority walk and carry up to 9 or 10 miles a day. And that’s after spending 3-4 hrs on their feet in the office sorting the mail up.7 -
Profit ? They did make a small operating profit last year, but that did not cover the huge losses of previous years. Their poor balance sheets are partly due to the huge drop in the letters market and the "postal" servicers who collect bulk mail from large customers and "dump" them on RM to deliver; that leg of the operation being the most costly. RM are forced to operate by law in a market that does not operate on a level playing field. The parcels sector keeps them afloat in a very competitive market of home delivery.ME14addick said:
I would never blame the postal workers they are victims of corporate greed which prioritises profit over service. Our postie is brilliant and I feel very sorry for him and his colleagues.paulbaconsarnie said:Letters are the last priorities and often get brought back to, or left in the office because the focus is getting the tracked mail (recorded or whatever it’s called) delivered by 1pm and parcels.
If rounds can’t be covered by the usual postie because of leave, sickness or staff shortages, the managers get other posties to prioritise the tracked and parcels on that round, before letters on their own.
Dont blame the people posting them through a week late. The majority walk and carry up to 9 or 10 miles a day. And that’s after spending 3-4 hrs on their feet in the office sorting the mail up.
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Pitiful service. Been away for a week no post when i got back last night. Today I got 8 items one dated 12th September sent first class.
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There is no attempt to meet targets at all, now they are foreign owned. Toothless Ofcom letting them get away with an increasingly shoddy service.Chippycafc said:Pitiful service. Been away for a week no post when i got back last night. Today I got 8 items one dated 12th September sent first class.2 -
I live in a rural town of about 9000, we have a sorting office that serves the local communities. My wonder is if the grand scheme is to destroy the service enough to only need the larger sorting offices and sell the lesser ones for development, then pocket the cash and run.1
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I was doing a mailing a while back and was speaking to the distributor about 1st vs 2nd class. They were like "no point paying for first class. It'll turn up about the same time, if you're lucky" made me laugh, but a shite state of affairs really!0
It's perfectly simple. 
