Royal Mail October 2023 Price Changes

WillPS

£1.55 for large letters is a real killer. I sell a lot of Lego minifigures, rarely more than 20g a piece and less than a cm in depth, even in the envelope, label, tape etc. It's getting to the point where selling them like this won't be viable anymore.

I'm sure it was half that when I started back in 2015, that's quite the hike!

olgadapolga

WillPS said:

£1.55 for large letters is a real killer. I sell a lot of Lego minifigures, rarely more than 20g a piece and less than a cm in depth, even in the envelope, label, tape etc. It's getting to the point where selling them like this won't be viable anymore.

I'm sure it was half that when I started back in 2015, that's quite the hike!

Almost - second class large letter was £0.74

soolin

km1500 said:

I would pay good money to avoid having to join a post office queue !

I currently putting my items direct in the post box most days and risking having no POP, if I have something more expensive then I aim to get to the mail centre once or twice a week, but that’s all. My post office queue , as I’ve mentioned before, I’d usually in excess of 30 minutes and I end up getting bored waiting. 

soolin

RFW said:

Amazon fulfillment announced last month that they are cancelling their small & light programme from late September.

Small & light was basically all letter and large letter items up to 250g, it was mostly all sent by Royal Mail. Presumably Amazon were given advanced notice about the price increases. I'm assuming they'll be losing a lot of Amazon trade.

So if you buy any smaller items on Amazon and elsewhere it's worth looking at stocking up this side of October. We sellers will have no choice but to increase those prices. I sell quite a lot of £2 and £3 items and they will have to go up by at least a third.

With increases coming at me from all angles I'm looking at options beyond online selling now, it's becoming unsustainable. I'm also in a partly seasonal industry and another round of strikes on top of price increases will end a big chunk of it.

Interestingly a number of Inpost items where labels are supplied by Vinted are now being fulfilled via RM48. The buyer pays approx £2.89 so Vinted must have negotiated an extremely good deal! 

GaleSF63

misterthrifty said:

This seems to be another step in RM squirming out of the Universal Service which they agreed to when it was privatised. Ofcom say that a 50% fall in letters may justify getting rid of Saturday deliveries but this was largely due to the disastrous RM management and the huge increase in stamp prices! They can't increase 2nd class as the prices have to be linked to inflation, otherwise they would be going up too. Soon we may lose 6 day deliveries so they can do a round only on selected days.
RM have been encouraging customers to not the the PO's which means smaller offices will close as they aren't cost effective. We once had a postal service that we could be proud of....

The parcels I send are collected as I am not mobile enough to go to the Post Office. Last time they were collected and I mentioned to the postman that I liked the collection service I got a mini lecture from him about how post offices were closing because they weren't being used.

misterthrifty

GaleSF63 said:

The parcels I send are collected as I am not mobile enough to go to the Post Office. Last time they were collected and I mentioned to the postman that I liked the collection service I got a mini lecture from him about how post offices were closing because they weren't being used.

It's true. Banks have been closing branches relying on the PO's to provide a banking service, RM & even the Gov't have been moving services away from PO's too. By the time they start closing it will be too late and particularly older people on pensions won't have any access to financial services. The only time I have to queue in my PO is when the pensioners are there.

neviboss1

I agree the price rise is ridiculous, as previous posters have mentioned RM want to remove Saturday deliveries of mail, I they want to just deliver parcels, I tracked and special delivery items.

They then would be able to reduce the workforce, as everybody would work Monday to Friday. Saturday and Sunday would be covered by new starters abs agency staff.

Spoonie_Turtle

misterthrifty said:

GaleSF63 said:

The parcels I send are collected as I am not mobile enough to go to the Post Office. Last time they were collected and I mentioned to the postman that I liked the collection service I got a mini lecture from him about how post offices were closing because they weren't being used.

It's true. Banks have been closing branches relying on the PO's to provide a banking service, RM & even the Gov't have been moving services away from PO's too. By the time they start closing it will be too late and particularly older people on pensions won't have any access to financial services. The only time I have to queue in my PO is when the pensioners are there.

Not really the fault of people who can't get to them and have to use collections though.

You also can't really blame people when buying postage at the PO is more expensive, nor if collections are more convenient and don't eat into their time in the working week like waiting at the PO does - especially as collections bring the label and save you that job and your printer ink and paper as well.

It's a vicious cycle, one catalysed by RM undercutting the Post Office and exacerbated by people needing to save money.

Incidentally the nearby commuter town, on a main train line into London (so not a backwater, reasonably busy and ever expanding) no longer has a bank branch or a Post Office.  There are bus services to places with Post Offices or banks but you have to be physically capable of walking to/from the bus stops if you can't drive.  Or a train ride away, but the train station is not accessible to anyone with mobility difficulties.

Scottman

The best saving on post is to ignore First Class delivery costs.  There is no first class about it.  You may pay, hoping for it,  but your faith will not be rewarded. 

The breakdown is at the point of delivery - to those who have NOT paid for the service - its largely hidden from the purchaser.

Our experience is that delivery of first and second class is one and the same.  We get a mail delivery now only once a week.  50% of cards for birthdays and Christmas are delivered 1 to 2 weeks after the event,  even though posted a week or more before it.

Scottman

I could go on ...so I will.

I now have to visit our local sorting office to collect urgent post.  It is now open only 8 to 10 am,  so a real difficulty for those at work.  

Listening to people in the regular queues - people coming from surrounding villages up to 15 miles out, because they are awaiting a prescription,  a medicine delivery,  a hospital appointment,  even a court summons. Its ridiculous.  Parking and speeding fines with limited time to appeal....

And quietly,  stealthily,  the RM has reset all our post boxes to 0900 am last post - effectively giving themselves an extra day of incompetence.

I know a few posties so do not blame them - like doctors and nurses they are working against increasingly difficult odds.  Management appears clueless and careless unless,  as others have said,  they are trying to extinguish the letter service altogether.