saturday postage

[andy20678]

what do you think if the royal mail stops doing saturday posting as they are thinking of it

[*devils.advocate*]

Think a more important question is what happens if RM stop delivering letters / large letters anywhere within UK at a low flat standard price without additional surcharges - in other words, the demise of the Universal Service Obligation.

Which other carrier / courier do you think will rush to replace them?

None perhaps?

Surely some deliveries during the week is better than none at all?

[myriad*seller]

Press headline recently 

"More than 47,000 UK businesses on ‘brink of collapse’, warn insolvency experts" 

I imagine RM are struggling just the same....  

[theelench]

If it happens, I wonder if ebay will take any notice of the change and if the 'Dynamic FDD Calculation' will immediately remove Saturday as a working day?

Or will ebay just ignore it, give sellers even more Late Delivery Defects and still claim it's working perfectly?

[papso22]

It would only be letters that were not delivered on Saturdays, parcels will still be delivered at least 6 days a week.

Differentiating would be a nightmare for ebay!

[eastern-lights]

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@theelench wrote:

If it happens, I wonder if ebay will take any notice of the change and if the 'Dynamic FDD Calculation' will immediately remove Saturday as a working day?

Or will ebay just ignore it, give sellers even more Late Delivery Defects and still claim it's working perfectly?

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I thought it was up to the seller to decide whether or not Saturday is a working day? In settings under postal preferences. Or does that not count in Ebay's late delivery calculations?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/help/selling/posting-items/estimated-delivery-dates-sellers?id=4086#:~:text=W....

[vinylscot]

The problem with EDDs, which even eBay will need to acknowledge, is that, if mail is only being delivered three days a week, it won't be delivered on the same three days everywhere. Also, many businesses get their outgoing mail picked up by the postman when he makes his delivery, so won't be able to send as regularly either.

Presuming that nowhere will have two consecutive non-delivery days, eBay will need to add at least two days to all EDD estimates, effectively making them even more pointless than they are now. Without a uniform, nationwide standard of service, predictions of expected delivery dates will be a nonsense.

[rjwilmsi]

As I understand it the USO changes only apply to 1st/2nd mail. So that would be used on eBay for small or low value items. If RM reduce that service to 5 days a week then no big deal I think - those services are not guaranteed as 1 or 2 days currently anyway.

Sending larger or more valuable items on eBay should already be using RM Tracked or Special Delivery (if using RM), and those services are outside of USO, so won't make any difference there.

So if the change is a non-guaranteed service reduces from 6 to 5 days a week, minimal impact I say.

At the rate of increase to 1st class Large Letter prices (now £1.95 for 100g, was £1.60 in 04/2023, £1.45 in 04/2022, £1.29 in 04/2021) compared to Tracked 48 LL (£2.70 and has come down in that time) sellers using Royal Mail retail services will probably in 2 or 3 years time be in the position that Tracked is cheaper than 1st class, so won't be using any USO services. Which I think is RM's overall objective anyway.