Royal Mail has been accused of masking problems with its cost-cutting modernisation programme by blaming the poor weather and the Icelandic ash cloud for failing to meet its latest set of targets.
The company recently revealed it had its worst performance between January to March 2011, failing its targets for First Class, Second Class or Special Delivery based on raw data. At a local level it did not meet its target for First Class deliveries in 92 out of 118 Postcode Areas.
In response to Royal Mail’s performance statistics, Robert Hammond, head of post and digital communications at watchdog Consumer Focus, said: “We cannot judge whether Royal Mail has failed to meet its service targets from this data. Royal Mail uses figures it has adjusted to take account of disruption from snow and volcanic ash. These adjustments have not yet been reviewed or accepted by Postcomm and the regulator is unlikely to do so until the autumn. Until it does so, this remains Royal Mail’s view only.
It said that when scrutinising these figures Postcomm would need to consider in particular that Royal Mail’s poor performance in January to March happened when weather conditions had improved; that the worst spell of weather in December is excluded from this period; and that there is evidence of local delivery problems caused by Royal Mail’s modernisation scheme.
Royal Mail cited the volcanic ash in April and extreme weather as mitigating factors for the failures, but ash disrupted air transport for only 6 days and the poor winter weather only lasted for four weeks – the last two weeks of November and the first two weeks of January (the Christmas period is exempted from these targets).
Royal Mail attributed its poor performance in January to disruption from continued severe weather and the Christmas backlog. However, the Met Office indicates that poor weather only continued for the first 10 days of January, localised mostly to Scotland, with this February one of the warmest in 100 years, and March warmer and drier than normal.
While Consumer Focus said it recognised that changes to modernise local services were needed, it had received strong anecdotal evidence of local communities experiencing delayed deliveries and other disruption as a result, alongside further information of problems from Royal Mail.
One postal source said: “There is no way all these delays can be attributed wholly to bad weather and ash clouds. We know for instance that Royal Mail had to draft in managers to some areas which were struggling to clear backlogs and this is symptomatic of a service cut too close to the bone.”
With consumers facing two more years of modernisation, Consumer Focus said it was important for Royal Mail to work harder to minimise disruption and communicate better with customers about the problems that will be caused and that it was also important for Royal Mail is able to effectively monitor and quickly respond to problems experienced around modernisation changes at a local level.
