Seeing as there is currently a fuss about the possible partial privitisation of the Royal Mail, it is good time to add a little support for the Royal Mail as it is. The introduction of private sector “expertese” may not improve the service for customers – indeed may make things worse. Of course those who champion the private sector claim that it will improve the service which I do not believe will be the case at all.
Speaking in particular on parcels (as I have little interest in letters as most of them seem to be bills or junk mail), the Royal Mail delivers a service that is far better than private sector delivery companies (excluding supermarkets who seem to be able to organise deliveries far better than those whose business is making deliveries). As a single person, I am often during the working week to be found at work!
If you order something from the Internet, you can sometimes ask for it to be delivered to your work address – if you have a co-opertive workplace (and workplace that doesn’t like workers having parcels delivered to work is to put it mildly completely bonkers). But not always.
And of course if you have something delivered to your home address, it will normally be delivered when you are out. I happen to be home at lunchtime which gives an extra window of opportunity for the delivery people to catch me in. And what “company” manages that more than any other ? Yes, the Royal Mail.
As it happens I have one of those little notices saying that some company tried to make a delivery and I was not in. I can ask for it to be redelivered to the same address (when I will almost certainly also be out unless I take an extra day off work), or I can pick it up from the depot. Where are all these depots ? Well they all seem to be in industrial estates miles from anywhere and almost always very difficult to get to with public transport (I don’t drive).
Except of course for the Royal Mail who alternate between my local post office (which is less than 100 metres from my flat) or the local “big” post office, which is somewhat further but far easier to get to than some out of town industrial estate.
If I had the choice when ordering things from the Internet, I would always opt for a Royal Mail delivery even if it were 25% more expensive. But as soon as private sector “expertese” gets to work, I dare say the Royal Mail will start behaving like other delivery companies and having cheap out of town collection depots.