Royal Mail is facing the threat of industrial action following its decision to close its defined benefit pension scheme, affecting 90,000 members. The privatised UK postal operator announced on Thursday that its £7.4bn defined benefit scheme will close to future accruals after March 2018, saying that “there is no affordable solution to keeping the plan open in its current form”. Source: Royal Mail faces strike threat after pension scheme closure Stamp collectors are furious at PostNL‘s decision to stop stamping the date on stamps and to strike them through with a pen instead. ‘It’s a disaster for stamp collectors,’ said Martijn Bulterman, chairman of the Dutch stamp traders association NVPH. By putting a pen stroke through the stamps they are ‘effectively being ruined’, Bulterman told the Telegraaf. Continue reading From the Financial Times: Shares in Royal Mail dropped more than 5 per cent after the group reported a drop in letters delivered before the festive period as business uncertainty in the UK hit junk mailings. Rising parcel numbers failed to make up for the chronic decline in paper-based correspondence at the postal service’s core British business, pushing the division’s revenue down 2 per cent in the nine months ending on Christmas Day. Read the full story: Royal Mail shares hit after sharp drop in letter volumes Royal Mail has awarded its chief executive Moya Greene an annual pay package of £1.5m, similar to last year, and made some changes to its pay policy for the coming years to satisfy major shareholders. The 500-year-old postal delivery company stressed that last year was the only time Greene’s pay had been increased since she joined in July 2010. In that period, the pay of postmen and women had gone up by 11%. Source: Royal Mail’s Moya Greene reaps another £1.5m pay package | Business | The Guardian From the Communication Workers Union: Union leaders will be recommending acceptance of a one-year, no-strings-attached pay increase achieved during national negotiations with Royal Mail. The proposal, which has met with the approval of the union’s industrial executive, is fully consolidated and will lift basic pay by 1.6 per cent for all CWU-represented grades within the business apart from Romec and Quadrant, whose pay awards are negotiated separately. Acting deputy general secretary (postal) Ray Ellis, said: “The view of the pay negotiating team, endorsed by the postal executive at its meeting yesterday, is that the offer represents an acceptable conclusion to the 2016 pay talks that meets the policies we have adopted for a clean, one-year, no-strings deal. “The offer will therefore be recommended for acceptance in an individual members’ ballot, which opens on June 9th and closes on the 30th.” The Financial Times reports that Royal Mail is acquiring or investing in small ecommerce and technology startups: While the deals are modest in size, they illustrate how Royal Mail, which was privatised in 2013, is sowing seeds in new areas that it hopes will provide future revenue growth. “They’re buying innovative software and expertise,” says Robin Byde, analyst at Cantor Fitzgerald. “It all speaks to the issue of declining core mail but is also a response to growing ecommerce flows. They’re positioning themselves in the plumbing space for the global supply chain.” Source: Royal Mail buys digital businesses to spur growth – FT.com Royal Mail will escape new price controls after the communications and regulator declared the universal postal system was working in its current form. Publishing the initial findings of its review, launched in July last year, the regulator said it would not impose new price caps on Royal Mail. “Given the declining letters market, and increased competition in parcels, Ofcomis not proposing to impose new price controls on Royal Mail’s wholesale or retail products.” It added: “The universal postal service is financially sustainable, while current rules and safeguards for people and businesses who use post are generally working well.” Source: Royal Mail escapes price caps after Ofcom says service working well | Business | The Guardian
Royal Mail has reported a 33% fall in annual profits and warned that market conditions remain “challenging” despite rising parcel volumes. It said pre-tax profits for the year to the end of March were £267m compared with £400m a year earlier. UK revenue fell 1% to £7.6bn from £7.7bn a year earlier as letter volumes and revenue fell by 3% and 2%. UK parcel volumes grew 3%, but revenue was only 1% higher. Read more: Royal Mail warns market remains ‘challenging’ – BBC News From the Communication Workers Union: Post Office reps and branch secretaries from across the UK will be meeting in central London next Monday to decide their response to management’s latest attack on members’ jobs. Over 500 people working in Post Office Supply Chain – delivering cash and valuables to post offices and other businesses, as well as those processing cash – are threatened with the axe, after this morning’s shock announcement by the company’s chief executive Paula Vennells. “The Supply Chain job cuts have come as a direct result of the Post Office announcing they’re voluntarily pulling out of external CViT work – which is an almost unbelievably bad business decision.” Separated from Royal Mail by the 2011 Postal Services Act, the Post Office here in the UK is the only one in the world which has been separated from the national mail delivery service and the CWU maintains that this decision has greatly damaged the network’s viability. CWU acting DGSP Ray Ellis said: “There’s no doubt that separation has hit both the Crown office counters and the cash in transit operations hard, but Post Office management have also completely failed to develop either of these functions as successful businesses.” Next Monday’s meeting will consider all options in order to hammer out a strategy to defend members’ jobs and to put forward a positive future strategy for the business. General secretary Dave Ward said: “With this latest round of job losses, the management of the Post Office has to face the facts that it is in crisis and heading for ruin. If they care about the future of the network they should resign in protest at the straight-jacket government cuts have left them in. “The Post Office was split from Royal Mail in 2012 in the run-up to privatisation and we are yet to see a plan that will secure its future. With a cut in its funding from £210m in 2013, to zero in 2019, these job losses show that under Sajid Javid’s leadership the Post Office is heading the same way as the steel industry.” Brian Scott, the Unite union’s national officer for Post Office managerial grades, said that the company’s proposals would “tear the heart out of the Post Office.” The 79 redundancies of Unite members announced today would “take the total number of proposed job losses to 130 in the last two weeks,” he added. · For more information, click hereSource: Union says ‘No’ to Post Office destruction
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Royal Mail faces strike threat after pension scheme closure
Stamp collectors furious over pen strokes replacing date cancellations on Dutch stamps
Royal Mail to honour David Bowie with a set of 10 Special Stamps
Royal Mail shares hit after sharp drop in letter volumes
Royal Mail’s Moya Greene reaps another £1.5 million pay package
The company, privatised in two share offerings in 2013 and 2015, has came under fire in recent years for the pay packages handed to Greene, including a 13% rise in total remuneration last year. Its latest annual report (pdf) shows that Greene is being paid £1.529m this year, compared with £1.522m in 2015.Union urges ‘Yes’ to 1.6% Royal Mail offer
Backdated to April 4th 2016 for weekly-paid staff and to April 1st 2016 for monthly-paid, the increase flows through to all pay supplements, skills and unsocial attendance allowances, London Weighting, Scottish Distant Island allowance, overtime and scheduled attendance rates and matches the March 2016 retail price index (RPI), keeping members’ earnings up with the cost of living.Royal Mail buys digital businesses to spur growth
The FTSE 100 group has made several acquisitions since the start of last year, from a mobile fashion app to a start-up selling software for online retailers in China.Royal Mail escapes price caps after Ofcom says service working well
The company has been the subject of an Ofcom investigation following concerns that it no longer had competition in the delivery of letters when rival Whistl withdrew from the market.Royal Mail warns market remains ‘challenging’ as profits fall 33%
Royal Mail chief executive Moya Greene said: “We have delivered a resilient performance in challenging markets.”UK Union says ‘No’ to Post Office destruction
The cutbacks amount to some 50 per cent of the entire supply chain workforce, explained CWU assistant secretary Andy Furey, who notes that, taken together with the controversial Crown Office franchising programme, “over 1,000 jobs are being slashed by the Post Office, which is quite astonishing.
