The changes will see Royal Mail stop second-class letter deliveries on Saturdays
The owner of Royal Mail has announced that it will not roll out changes, including the discontinuation of second-class letter deliveries on Saturdays, across the UK until early next year.
International Distribution Services (IDS), purchased by Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky’s EP Group last year for £3.6 billion, has been conducting a trial in 35 delivery offices to revamp letter delivery services. This includes scrapping second-class deliveries on Saturdays and altering the service to every other weekday.
Regulator Ofcom gave IDS the go-ahead to start implementing these reforms from the end of July. However, in its half-year results released on Wednesday, the group stated that it would not begin further rolling out the new system more widely until early 2026.
In September, alongside full-year figures, IDS chief executive Martin Seidenberg described the reforms as a “massive task” and stated that they would “take the time to get this right” and not rush into expanding the reforms across its nationwide network.
At the time, IDS said it was too early to determine when the changes would be completed and which of its 1,200 delivery offices would be next in line for the overhaul.
Last month, Ofcom fined Royal Mail £21 million for failing to meet its annual first and second-class mail delivery targets, resulting in millions of late letters across the UK. This fine is the third-largest ever imposed by the communications watchdog.
Royal Mail delivered 77 per cent of first-class mail and 92.5 per cent of second-class mail on time during the 2024/25 financial year, Ofcom found.
As part of the reforms to the universal postal service, Ofcom has lowered targets for first-class post to be delivered the next day from 93 per cent to 90 per cent and second-class to be delivered within three days from 98.5 per cent to 95 per cent.
However, Ofcom has introduced a new “enforceable” backstop delivery target, meaning that 99 per cent of mail must be delivered no more than two days late.
The latest interim figures showed revenues at Royal Mail increased 1.5 per cent to £3.98 billion in the six months to September 28, as a 3.2 per cent rise for the parcels business offset a 0.4 per cent fall for letters.
Total revenues across the wider IDS group rose 1.6 per cent to £6.45 billion, with the GLS international parcel business seeing revenues climb by 1.9 per cent to £2.48 billion.
Royal Mail said the performance was set against a “backdrop of rising costs and macroeconomic pressures which are expected to continue into 2026”.
The group added: “These include national insurance contribution increases of around £120 million, increased wage costs in the UK business and complexities in the global trading environment.”
It also said it had recruited 20,000 temporary workers ahead of the busy Christmas season, with 7,000 new vans and the opening of four seasonal parcel sorting centres with an additional 118,000 square metres of extra space, which it said was equivalent to 16.5 football pitches. Mr Seidenberg stated: “We never underestimate the important role we play at Christmas and we are hiring more people, opening temporary parcel sorting centres and putting more vans on the road to deliver for our customers again this year.”
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