Yet another Royal Mail price increase

[qualitycardsandgifts]

Royal Mail has announced it will hike the price of first-class stamps by 30p due to "very real and urgent" financial challenges.

The increase, which will kick in from 7 October, will see the price of a first-class stamp rise to £1.65p, while second-class stamps will remain at 85p.

[therenewalworkshopltd]

What I want to know is whether it is possible top do a global change on the method of postage from 1st class to 2nd class or do I have to do each listing individually 

Of course it is, you just bulk edit and change to a new postage policy.

[dch2112011]

You are right on the button with those observations - shopping convenience, monopoly and pricing - the only addition is the massive downturn in letters being sent these days with email and text 'apps' taking over so the cost per letter has increased proportionately to the decline in numbers.

[555njp]

Totally agree with the convenience of buying online and it just turning up to your door.

Thankfully people being too lazy to go out and shop is keeping me here :0)

[therenewalworkshopltd]

There are some major changes coming to the Letter services and they will have some sort of effect.

I do think, that some kind of merged letter service will appear as well.  As the vast majority of letters these days, are either junk mail, or items being delivered.  Virtually none of it now, is correspondence.

But if that does happen, it should at least standardise costs.

Unless the prices go that high, that it's more than 3/4 times the actual retail price, the market is going to continue.   And even then, some will continue to buy.   People are lazy and will happily pay over the odds for convenience.

[qualitycardsandgifts]

I only post second class, but with the unrealistic EDDs, I've had to refund three orders this week.    Posting first class to try to avoid late deliveries definitely won't be an option.

Not  everyone will increase their prices, as the greetings cards sector has lots of 'private' sellers who have much lower costs.   

[sea.n.van._60]

There are bulk editing tools but they might be limited to business sellers. Otherwise, maybe you could just go ahead and buy one or two thousand stamps now, while the prices are lower.

[pzkpfwv1d]

I found the way, went into a listing and edited the postage changed it from first class to second class and this is a global fix

[therenewalworkshopltd]

What you have done, is to change the current postage policy that you are using, on the listing that you changed.

So if you use more than one, the other policies won't be changed.

You are better off having separate polices that you can interchange as required.

And though it may appear to be a global change, it will ONLY affect those listings that are using that specific policy.

[darth_baggins]

I wasn't complaining, just stating a fact.

[pzkpfwv1d]

Yes, but seeing as the policy changed relates to more than 95% of all the listing I have that is what applies, other listings are for other items 

[therenewalworkshopltd]

Ok, but you are missing the point a bit.

The best way to do it, is to change/create a shipping policy that you want everything/selected to use.

Then apply that policy to the listings that require changing.

It's a lot more specific and should be more accurate.  Unless you only have half a dozen listings.

[therenewalworkshopltd]

The post was not aimed at anyone in particular.

[infinibrix]

Personally I get the impression that the Royal Mail is wanting to ensure 1st class customers are actually getting the service they paid for with their items prioritised over 2nd!

Only after speaking to a couple of my posties in recent months they told me that 1st class Letter rates are currently being treated pretty much the same way regardless of them being standard 1st or 2nd and this has all occurred since the increase in their parcel services taking priority. I therefore get the impression it’s a case of wanting to re-establish 1st class back to what it once was where you could almost be certain it would arrive next day however I suspect that can only happen if less people are using the service.

Essentially it’s probably a good thing for everyone in a sense because with more people opting for 2nd (Probably same service they get now anyway) it will free up 1st for those that really need it rather than it just being used by everyone simply because it’s only a few pence more. Essentially the RM will always attempt to deliver their mail next day and the only reason that might not occurr is if too much mail is going through the system on any given day where a mix of Letter rate stuff may be left to sit but that can sometimes include both 1st and 2nd class mail and I get the feeling that the idea here is to enable them to home in on a much more mangable amount 1st class and make sure this always gets delivered rather than it sometimes sitting idle amongst the masses of other 2nd class letters

Either way it will be interesting to see if ebay take note and adjust their seller expectations/policy slightly since they currently expect Top Rated sellers to ship fast (1st class) and free but this is quickly becoming unrealistic and unviable and will only mean more sellers choosing to opt out of completely with trying to meet all the top rated seller criteria which in turn will mean opting out of all those other requirements that ebay expects and wants from its sellers and with less sellers offering things like free shipping and 30 days return the site starts to lose its appeal amongst its customer base. The only compriomise I can see would be to allow Top rated sellers to ship free with 2nd class instead of 1st!

[leon9503]

Around here they only drop letters every week or 2 weeks in batches so EB dates for some items are lost in space....

From what we've been told they make more money dropping junk mail than deliveries and then there's the 40K a month the CEO gets before bonuses....The one who's in the process of ruining RM as he did with Test & Trace and also the EV vans which cost twice as much to run as the Vans they replace, it'll be dead in the water soon.

[therenewalworkshopltd]

 "since they currently expect Top Rated sellers to ship fast (1st class) and free"

No they don't!  I'm top rated and getting the extra discount, but everything I send is second/or tracked 48.

[infinibrix]

To be honest a few things may have since changed from where I last checked to make sure I was conforming to the Top Rated Seller requirements. I may need to give it all another refresh.

[therenewalworkshopltd]

eBay Premium Service

Once you've reached Top Rated status, you can choose to provide eBay Premium Service for some or all of your listings. Any qualifying listings will show the eBay Premium Service badge to let buyers know that you offer high levels of customer service.

For your listings to qualify for eBay Premium Service, they must:

• Offer a free domestic delivery option within 3 working days*
• Offer an express delivery option within 2 working days for no more than £10
• For items over £20, all of the delivery services must be designated tracked services, and valid tracking must be uploaded within the dispatch time. This includes auction-style listings and Best Offers where the final price is over £20

[therenewalworkshopltd]

To be quite honest, I don't remember it ever requiring first class delivery.

There needs to be an option there, for the customer to upgrade it.  But second, is pretty much standard.

[infinibrix]

This was definitely one of the requirements when I setup my business 10+ years ago. There was a strong emphasis on ebay wanting its customer to receive their goods promptly in order to compete with Amazons speedy goods to door service. Not offering fast and free shipping (Don’t even think ebay use that term now?) meant missing out on key perks

[therenewalworkshopltd]

You may be right.  

I haven't noticed fast and free for quite a while now.  

But I do seem to remember it being the same terms, fast was never next day.  Of that I am certain.  🙂

Though to be fair, my main focus up until the last couple of years was always Amazon.  Ebay was the sideline.