Royal Mail local failure – official

Our thanks to Heather Jones for drawing our attention to a piece in a national newspaper on Saturday that confirmed that the CW area is the worst in the land for postal deliveries.

In the 12 months from March last year, an average of 85.4% of first class post in the Crewe area reached its destination the next day, compared with a national average of 93%

Union leaders blamed the closure of the of the Crewe Sorting Office as responsible for the poor service.

Fortunately for the Royal Mail, some of its most humiliating disasters were not featured in the national newspaper. These included Christmas cards still being delivered in Hankelow in May this year, as reported on Audlem Online.

Local complaints about the service were met with customary defiance by Royal Mail who answered Audlem Online's official complaint with the declaration that we had "received exemplary service." But maybe the Royal Mail's Statistics department, who made this most recent declaration about local service, and the Complaints departments who answered our letters, don't speak to each other.

Fortunately, she who never seems to answer letters, the Royal Mail's chief executive, Moya Green, has a cunning plan. Yesterday's Sunday Times reported that she plans to cut 40,000 jobs – or 25% of the workforce. This is designed to cope with tumbling postal volumes.

Undoubtedly there are long term issues as a result of increasing usage of emails and electronic transactions and much more, but failing to deliver Christmas cards before Christmas, and allowing some to wait until May, is a sure-fire way to discourage people from using the service.

Elementary, Dear Watson, as the master detective may have addressed his assessment of Royal Mail''s plan.

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