On your marks, set, no! Olympics will delay parcels by a day and cost 1 extra
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UPDATED:
09:15 GMT, 18 May 2012
Olympic flame: Princess Anne raises a torch next to Spyros Kapralos, head of the Greek Olympic Committee
Royal Mail came under fire last night for using the Olympics as an excuse to impose a 1 ‘tax’ on parcels.
It will raise prices and cut delivery targets during the six-week Games period because of the expected traffic chaos.
It means anyone using Royal Mail’s Parcelforce arm to post a parcel to much of London will have to pay an extra pound.deliveries could be delayed by an extra day because of the disruption caused by the Olympics.
In addition, customers have been warned that any letter or parcel posted from the start of the Olympics on July 27 until the final day of the Paralympics on September 9 could take at least one extra day to arrive.
Royal Mail will also scrap the pledge for Special Delivery items to arrive by 9am or before 1pm next day, downgrading the guarantee to ‘the next day’.
Yesterday’s announcement – immediately described as a ‘tax on business’ – affects items sent to any of London’s eight main postcodes.
Postal deliveries will be disrupted by the Games this summer
These are E, EC, N, NW, SE, SW, W and WC, covering around two million homes and businesses.
Anybody outside London who needs to send post to one of these areas is being told to send it a day earlier than usual. Within London, it should go ‘earlier in the day than usual’.
The Royal Mail’s normal pledge is that a first-class letter will arrive the next working day, and a second-class one within three working days.
Parcelforce’s 1 charge will replace the 50p surcharge which is already levied on parcels sent to postcodes in central London affected by the capital’s congestion charge.
The announcement comes weeks after Royal Mail hit its customers with inflation-busting increases in stamp prices. A first-class stamp, which used to be 46p, now costs 60p. A 36p second-class stamp has jumped to 50p.
Major delays are expected on London's transport routes – commuters are advised not to travel by tube
Yesterday’s statement from Royal Mail points out that its rivals, such as UPS, are also levying extra charges during the Olympics period, with many charging far more than Royal Mail’s extra fee.
But Phil McCabe, from the Forum of Private Business, said: ‘Whilst I can understand that there may be disruption as a result of the Olympics, charging considerably more for a poorer service is an equation that does not add up.
‘Many of our members rely on Royal Mail’s postal service, and will struggle as a result of yet another price rise when the service is being cut.’
Tory MP Brian Binley, who sits on the Business and Innovation Select Committee which oversees the Royal Mail, said the fee was ‘a tax on business’ and ‘a blackmailing surcharge’.
Mark Thomson, Olympic director for Royal Mail, said: ‘We will continue to collect and deliver six days a week despite the inevitable impact on the capital’s transport system.’
Robert Hammond of Consumer Focus said: ‘We recognise that hosting the Olympic and Paralympic Games will throw up logistical challenges for many organisations.
‘We’re satisfied that Royal Mail is planning ahead as much as it can, and aims to keep customer disruption to a minimum.
‘We would ask customers in London to bear with Royal Mail if their post arrives a little later during the Olympics.’
Expect traffic jam 'chaos' on the first three days of the Games
Unlike many other workers, Royal Mail staff will not receive an ‘Olympic bonus’, the company said last night.
They will be paid overtime, worth up to 1.65 times the normal 11.97 hourly rate for a postman in inner London, according to figures from the Communication Workers’ Union.
Parcelforce is having to spend more than 1million, employ an extra 260 staff and hire 140 vehicles to keep packages moving during the Olympics.