TNT expands final mile deliveries

TNT Post has revealed it is to expand its end-to-end mail delivery service as the dulcet tones of Labour MP Dennis Skinner – “Royal Mail for sale. Queen’s head privatised” – started the countdown to the sell-off of its main rival.
The company, which began its trial mail delivery service 13 months ago in West London, is now preparing to roll out the service to South West London.
TNT Post UK has 350 mail delivery staff delivering on alternate days, three-days-a-week. The trial has since expanded to the City of London, and has already delivered more than 16m items of business mail, reaching a rate of 600,000 items per week last month.
The company now has more than 600 delivery staff based out of six delivery units, and is now aiming to progress towards the 1 million items a week.
Herna Verhagen, the chief executive of Dutch postal service PostNL, said: “Customers are satisfied because of the quality, but also because we have a track-and-trace system on mail items in the UK, so customers can follow deliveries on the Internet. This is new, it’s a unique selling point in the mail market.”
The move comes as the privatisation of Royal Mail moves a step closer, even though it was not actually mentioned in today’s Queen’s Speech. The sell-off, expected to bring in between £2bn-£3bn, will rival the privatisations of British Gas and BT in the Eighties. It will also be the largest employee share scheme for 25 years with around 140,000 workers expected to scoop a windfall.

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