This is an undercover documentary about the company I work for, below is some information about the company, I wish people were aware of this as it's the staff that get blamed for the current state of the company and not the government! 
Ok, I'll put it into perspective for you.
Royal Mail is supposed to be a Public Service and is obligated to posting to every household in the UK at least once a day. Now as a Government owned Public Service this has worked for years and everyone has been happy.
Now, over the last four years, the Government has said, we want to semi-privatise Royal Mail, we want to run it as a profit making business and not a public service, so this is what you have.
They tried to rebrand it Consignia in their bid to go into full privatisation, this was never accepted by the public , commerce or industry, after spending £5million on rebranding the stationary and just before they rebranded all the uniform and vehicles they did a u-turn, a big financial loss then???
They then spent £200million on fitting a system called Horizon into all UK Post Offices, which was supposed to simplify paying benefits to doleys and pensioners, after fitting Horizon, the Government said, we have a better idea, we'll pay these people directly into their bank accounts via BACS, we no longer need Horizon, this was of course after installing it. It now remains redundant and is not used, consequently Post Offices have been shut up and down the country because they are no longer required, and of course to save money. Another loss then???
Then they went on a venture to buy foreign Postal Services, they went crazy and snapped up a load for a high price, found that they could not make them profitable and sold them on at a loss of about £600million if my memory serves me well.
These losses have been unsustainable, so they brought in Alan Leighton and Adam Crozier. By the way in 1997 Royal Mail was making £800million in profit annually, by 2001 it was losing £1million a day, now when did NuLabour come to power???
Ok, back to Leighton and Crozier, they decided Royal Mail can be a lucrative business like Asda or football clubs, so in come their changes which have been:
To cut a postmans earning potential from £500 a week in 1999 if he did 20 hours overtime to £500 a week in 2004 but doing 30 hours overtime, the figures are not exact, but a guide, so the guys do longer hours for less pay. Their only perk is getting round the delivery as quickly as they can to get home earlier.
They decided that Royal Mail could deliver the same service by cutting 30,000 posties from 160,000 to 130,000 and yet the posties are expected to still give the same service.
Now they have decided to scrap the Second Delivery and they are nationally going to Single Daily Delivery, which to you means that the postmans delivery span has gone from 3 hours to four and a half hours because they've added another half of a delivery to each round from the guys deliveries they made redundant! The guys now also leave the delivery offices at 0900 (which means you can expect you mail anytime between 0900 and 1700) and not 0630 as before. They now have to endure 4 and a half hours in the rain, snow, etc. Oh, and if you pay an annual fee of £50, RM will try to get your post out to you before 0900.
Mail has been taken off the trains, this has failed miserably, the service has come to a standstill as the road freight systems can't cope with millions of items on a daily basis, so after getting rid of the eight mail trains they are now considering putting mail train back on! Another massive financial loss!
All of this has caused Royal Mail to provide a less than acceptable service since NuLabours rise, they have tried to make it a profitable commercial business and they are failing, it's a Public Service, full stop.
The postmen are demoralised, being paid less, being asked to do more and completely unappreciated. There is a massive culture at the moment within RM to sack permanent staff for sickness or attendance records and get in as many casuals from agencies to do the work. A lot of the casuals can't speak or read English as they are immigrants, and yet they are trusted to deliver your mail, but let's not forget, they are cheaper to employ, no sick pay, no holiday pay, etc.
I could go on about this for hours and do a full expose` but I guess you're getting bored with this now. My main point is don't blame the posties, all of this apathy, rebellion and demoralisation has been created by the Government, Allan Leighton and his mate Crozier and senior management. We are lucky that there haven't been massive postal strikes yet, but never say never!
Ok, I'll put it into perspective for you.
Royal Mail is supposed to be a Public Service and is obligated to posting to every household in the UK at least once a day. Now as a Government owned Public Service this has worked for years and everyone has been happy.
Now, over the last four years, the Government has said, we want to semi-privatise Royal Mail, we want to run it as a profit making business and not a public service, so this is what you have.
They tried to rebrand it Consignia in their bid to go into full privatisation, this was never accepted by the public , commerce or industry, after spending £5million on rebranding the stationary and just before they rebranded all the uniform and vehicles they did a u-turn, a big financial loss then???
They then spent £200million on fitting a system called Horizon into all UK Post Offices, which was supposed to simplify paying benefits to doleys and pensioners, after fitting Horizon, the Government said, we have a better idea, we'll pay these people directly into their bank accounts via BACS, we no longer need Horizon, this was of course after installing it. It now remains redundant and is not used, consequently Post Offices have been shut up and down the country because they are no longer required, and of course to save money. Another loss then???
Then they went on a venture to buy foreign Postal Services, they went crazy and snapped up a load for a high price, found that they could not make them profitable and sold them on at a loss of about £600million if my memory serves me well.
These losses have been unsustainable, so they brought in Alan Leighton and Adam Crozier. By the way in 1997 Royal Mail was making £800million in profit annually, by 2001 it was losing £1million a day, now when did NuLabour come to power???
Ok, back to Leighton and Crozier, they decided Royal Mail can be a lucrative business like Asda or football clubs, so in come their changes which have been:
To cut a postmans earning potential from £500 a week in 1999 if he did 20 hours overtime to £500 a week in 2004 but doing 30 hours overtime, the figures are not exact, but a guide, so the guys do longer hours for less pay. Their only perk is getting round the delivery as quickly as they can to get home earlier.
They decided that Royal Mail could deliver the same service by cutting 30,000 posties from 160,000 to 130,000 and yet the posties are expected to still give the same service.
Now they have decided to scrap the Second Delivery and they are nationally going to Single Daily Delivery, which to you means that the postmans delivery span has gone from 3 hours to four and a half hours because they've added another half of a delivery to each round from the guys deliveries they made redundant! The guys now also leave the delivery offices at 0900 (which means you can expect you mail anytime between 0900 and 1700) and not 0630 as before. They now have to endure 4 and a half hours in the rain, snow, etc. Oh, and if you pay an annual fee of £50, RM will try to get your post out to you before 0900.
Mail has been taken off the trains, this has failed miserably, the service has come to a standstill as the road freight systems can't cope with millions of items on a daily basis, so after getting rid of the eight mail trains they are now considering putting mail train back on! Another massive financial loss!
All of this has caused Royal Mail to provide a less than acceptable service since NuLabours rise, they have tried to make it a profitable commercial business and they are failing, it's a Public Service, full stop.
The postmen are demoralised, being paid less, being asked to do more and completely unappreciated. There is a massive culture at the moment within RM to sack permanent staff for sickness or attendance records and get in as many casuals from agencies to do the work. A lot of the casuals can't speak or read English as they are immigrants, and yet they are trusted to deliver your mail, but let's not forget, they are cheaper to employ, no sick pay, no holiday pay, etc.
I could go on about this for hours and do a full expose` but I guess you're getting bored with this now. My main point is don't blame the posties, all of this apathy, rebellion and demoralisation has been created by the Government, Allan Leighton and his mate Crozier and senior management. We are lucky that there haven't been massive postal strikes yet, but never say never!
