Royal Mail Price Increase 2012

[JSR]

The Royal Mail have released their price increase for this year.

Just about all prices are up, as we probably all expected, from a 14p increase for a first class letter to a staggering £6.04 increase for a 10+Kg standard parcel.

There's a weight change as well as a price change.

All "packets" under 750g now go for the same price - so there's no handy "sub 500g" price for us sending individual mugs. Now they'll go in the 750g bracket. Don't need to bother with weight-conscious mug packaging anymore!

This effectively increases the "one mug" postage cost by 22p (1st Class), or 40p (1st Class Recorded), or 4p (2nd Class), or 22p (2nd Class Recorded). I guess there'll be a lot of mugs posted by 2nd Class in the future!

The only "decrease" I can find is if you tend to send two mugs together (weighing under 750g). These will now cost the same price as sending a single mug. This results in an effective decrease of 35p (1st Class), or 17p (1st Class Recorded), or 41p (2nd Class), or 23p (2nd Class Recorded).

There's a big increase in the 2-4Kg weight (up by £1.35 First Class, or £1.53 First Class Recorded), which will doubtless be good news for the couriers - who'll no doubt be quick to put up their prices now.

As mentioned above, Standard Parcels are up. A 10Kg parcel will now cost £5.19 more to send by Royal Mail. Five-day Standard Parcels over 6Kg costs more than Parcel Force 24 for 25Kg - what's that all about? And Special Delivery has had its usual price hike (the 100g price is what the 500g price was, and all the other weights have price increases too).

For full details: http://c435158.r58.cf3.rackcdn.com/Royal_Mail_Our_Prices.pdf

Be ready for it, otherwise you'll end up bankrupt by some of those price increases.

(All price differences shown above are calculated by tired eyes, so do check them out for yourself and don't rely on my post! :biggrin: )

[mrs maggot]

thanks JSR - nearly spat me coffee out as the Canadian boss told radio 4 - it was still less than a bar of chocolate to post a letter !! well thats well worked out then, on a cadburys sliding scale

[gstk]

We had Royal Mail on yesterday trying to get us to do online postage. Luckily (for them) my wife took the call and then proceeded to tell them what a pile of sh*t they are and that we had some first class packets go missing and claimed and all we got back was a token book of stamps. He then went on to say that RM dont pay compensation for anything sent first class because of all the dishonest ebay claims. One of the packets was our best customer and it was a follow on packet. They would never lie about receipt. He then asked how many packages we lost on average a year and when we said probably only about 10-15 he said we should consider that natural wastage like most firms and that we expected too much of the postal service (Again its a good job he said that to the good lady)

So basically RM are saying they coiuld bundle up a truck of first class post and incinerate it at source and not have to pay anyone out. I should tell customers that if they dont get their product to not be so picky and order another one and pay for it twice. That my friends is why I have no sympathy with RM and if its going to be like this then roll on privatisation.

[RogerC]

I wonder how much they will be charging for the extra 'special' service which loses your customers orders!!! I've had three orders (in envelopes) go missing in the last 5 weeks costing me dearly. It must be nice to have a business that takes your money and does not provide the service you paid for accompanied by such a flippant attitude to it's customers. I think my customers would want more than a book of stamps if I took their money and said 'oooops sorry I've lost my mugs...here's a book of stamps instead'.......rant over:biggrin:

[John G]

I must be the only person that agrees with the rise - you try taking a letter from lands end to john o groats for 60p.
There's transport companies, couriers and all manner of firms going bust at the moment and if it takes cost cutting, and a rise in stamp prices to keep this service going, then fair enough.

[JSR]

I must be the only person that agrees with the rise - you try taking a letter from lands end to john o groats for 60p.
There's transport companies, couriers and all manner of firms going bust at the moment and if it takes cost cutting, and a rise in stamp prices to keep this service going, then fair enough.

Unfortunately, I don't believe this is the reason for the price increase.

The increase in prices, together with Ofcom relaxing the restrictions on price increases and the government putting the Royal Mail's pension deficit onto the taxpayer, is all part of making the Royal Mail look more attractive for when they sell it off in the near future.

If prices were kept low, and the restrictions on increases maintained, together with the Royal Mail having to deal with their own pension mismanagement, no one would touch them and the privatisation wouldn't happen.

Make no mistake, this is all about making the Royal Mail look like a going concern to any prospective buyer and it has nothing to do with the actual cost of sending mail.

If it had to do with the cost of sending mail then, in a time that the Royal Mail say they are sending less and less items, they wouldn't be putting the prices up to make their service less attractive and less competitive. That's no way to increase business.

[John G]

You do have a point, but to keep it a going concern (even to make it look good for prospective buyers) the prices have had to rise. Without the rise, RM, would be losing money hand over fist, and wouldn't be a saleable commodity.

[RogerC]

I must be the only person that agrees with the rise - you try taking a letter from lands end to john o groats for 60p.
There's transport companies, couriers and all manner of firms going bust at the moment and if it takes cost cutting, and a rise in stamp prices to keep this service going, then fair enough.

I wouldn't object to the increase if their service was reliable. Over the last few weeks (as above) I have had envelopes lost and one delivery took over three weeks to arrive when it was paid 1st class. Increased prices are OK provided the service is made more reliable. Did you know that the PO does not guarantee next day delivery and from the 'post office horses mouth' they try to make sure 1st class mail is delivered within 3-4 days!!!! In that case if it gets there the next day you're lucky.

[JSR]

You do have a point, but to keep it a going concern (even to make it look good for prospective buyers) the prices have had to rise. Without the rise, RM, would be losing money hand over fist, and wouldn't be a saleable commodity.

True, but it would be wiser to look at why they're losing money "hand over fist" rather than just keep hiking up the prices.

After all, a business that has an increasingly large pension deficit that's unable to do anything about it for fear of strikes is one that's out-dated. The transfer of the Royal Mail pension scheme to the state will cost us (the taxpayer) £10bn from a total liability of £37.5bn. This isn't a deficit that's occurred overnight just because people are sending less mail. This is gross mismanagement that has been steadily getting worse because the Royal Mail's hands are tied every time they try and do something about it (every time they try, there's a strike).

As a result, privatisation is probably the only thing that could be done to escape this massive and ongoing black hole, because a private company would have different wage and pension guidelines by not being so archaic. Perhaps that's the real reason the government want to sell off the Royal Mail?

[John G]

Did you know that the PO does not guarantee next day delivery

It does - its called Special Delivery Next Day - its guaranteed to be delivered before 1.00pm