royal mail Now started charging 30 pence for collecting Simple delivery ebay parcels

[tickswift2]

Royal mail are now charging 30 pence for collecting postage labels that were purchased using simple delivery

so now ebay Labels that you have to purchase with no other alternative option Sellers are getting charged with 30 pence per item // Just happened to 

[vinylscot]

Your post does sort of make sense, but for one point.

Before SD, shipping charges were called "postage and packing", and constantly referred to as such throughout eBay's terms, help, and general discussion. 

So it is something new that private sellers now need to incorporate the cost of packing materials into the item cost. That extra, even if it is "less than a pound", which it usually is, can have a disproportionate effect on smaller value items, like so many of the recent changes.

[ruby*ryan]

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@podlingsmum2007 wrote:

It would not surprise me if The Post Office introduced a processing fee for Simple Delivery labelled parcels. The staff of the small family run post office I use told me they are receiving the same volume of parcels but are not selling any labels themselves and without revenue would be unable to pay their overheads. They are concerned that Simple Delivery could cause them to shut their doors and are having to wait and see how it pans out for them.

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I don't think they would be able to. Royal Mail set the postage cost, not the PO. If they were able to, then I would imagine people would just take parcels to another drop off point such as Parcel Boxes or Delivery/Sorting Offices to avoid the fee. 

[vinylscot]

The Post Office already receives differing payments for processing packages, depending on the nature of their contracts with Royal Mail, so in theory, it would be possible for them to increase the amount they charged for processing SD packages.

However, the current contract will have been agreed upon fairly recently (and remember, the PO agreed), and probably has at least a couple of years to run, so there is probably no scope for them to introduce any charges until the contract comes up for renewal.

[cbclassicbuyer]

I really can't see what all the faff is about. 

The 30p charge  has nothing to do with Ebay and it has nothing to do with Simple Delivery. It's a Royal Mail charge. Regardless of whether it's an online sale item being collected or a box of chocolates for your Nan, it's now 30p

On this occasion, Ebay are not to be blamed. 

[poshboutique2]

No,  it is not "subsidised" by those travelling to PO's.   If you haven't noticed, Royal Mail have implemented very large price increases over the past few years for all consumers making it one of the most expensive postal services in Europe. No need to pit those using the collection service against those that travel to the PO - it's a fallacy. Royal Mail don't care and will carry on increasing their prices for all consumers regardless.

[poshboutique2]

It's not free really. Royal Mail will have factored the cost of this service into the price of the products they sell. 

[dch2112011]

If you offered free delivery it was added into the item price and for those who added it to the postal cost - (many added it to the item price to show a true delivery cost) - the postal cost is now standardised  but the item price may be slightly higher -  this is a real positive and will deter profiteering from over inflated postal charges !   

You often could see sellers manipulating postal prices with no standardisation some adding far more than the packaging cost to the postal costs - to falsely make their item price lower or simply to profit from unsuspecting buyers

Another good point to SD !  There's a shock !

[akemp1]

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@poshboutique2 wrote:

No,  it is not "subsidised" by those travelling to PO's.   If you haven't noticed, Royal Mail have implemented very large price increases over the past few years for all consumers making it one of the most expensive postal services in Europe. No need to pit those using the collection service against those that travel to the PO - it's a fallacy. Royal Mail don't care and will carry on increasing their prices for all consumers regardless.

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Royal Mail are a loss making business and have the same inflationary pressures as other businesses. My view is they still provide a good value for money services particularly with Letter, Large Letter and Tracked48 rates. They don't exploit their workers, they tend to treat the items with respect and around here at least genuinely attempt to find safe places when people are not home.

Regardless it obviously costs more for RM to collect from individual addresses than in bulk from Post Offices (even after they have paid the PM a few pennies to handle the item) so if RM offered a single price for both then there would be a cross-subsidy between customer groups. It's only fair that we both pay they costs of getting the items into the RM network. In my case I pay it from the extra distance I need to drive for a collection customer the 30p seems reasonable.

[poshboutique2]

RM collect packages when delivering the post to your address or street. You created a false concept of a cross subsidy to satisfy your reasoning.  

[akemp1]

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@poshboutique2 wrote:

RM collect packages when delivering the post to your address or street. You created a false concept of a cross subsidy to satisfy your reasoning.  

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Minimum wage is £12.21 and most businesses have costs and overheads that roughly double the cost of labour so if the collection takes around 1 minute more of a postie's time then it's a cost of around 40p.

[poshboutique2]

Seriously, you've never used this service. It doesn't take a minute to hand over a parcel to someone who is delivering your post. They just take it and go. Anyway, this was a feature that gave them an edge over their rivals. Evri are cheaper but, unfortunately,  they can be unreliable losing parcels and so on. 

[dch2112011]

Some people think free really means free -  without thought for how free is paid for !

You are flogging a dead horse unfortunately !

[poshboutique2]

Evri are cheaper and you can print the labels for free in their parcelshops but they are so unreliable.

[akemp1]

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@dch2112011 wrote:

Some people think free really means free -  without thought for how free is paid for !

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Indeed. My understanding is that you can book a collection even when you do not have a delivery and some forum members have said that RM can have to drive a significant distance to do this for them so my circa 1 min per collection is an average accepting it might be quicker sometimes and longer at other times.

Well at least we can agree on "Evri are cheaper but, unfortunately,  they can be unreliable losing parcels and so on." as it's worth paying the 10% extra or therabouts for RM tracked 48 not just for the better service but for the £150 compensation.

[crafty_cat_lover]

I've used this service and it is not always a simple case of the postie taking a parcel when delivering the post.

My posties walk the round with a post bag not a trolley of any description. The parcel I had was heavy and large so the postie had to return in a van to collect. If several addresses had arranged collection then the postie could have a problem carrying all the parcels for the rest of his round. Personally I don't have a problem with RM adding a small charge for collection.

[lucy_farmer]

'Personally I don't have a problem with RM adding a small charge for collection.'

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Yep. I was amazed to learn it *wasn't* charged for!

[poshboutique2]

Despite the rather trivial justifications being given for the charge,  the odd thing is that RM are still offering free collection for parcels that are paid for via registered RM click and drop accounts. I think you have to print the label though.

[poshboutique2]

It is still free if you have a registered click and drop account with them.

[technthread]

Not on mine.

Home collections may drop through the floor now. They are also going to lose business to competitors. Well done Royal Mail. 

[akemp1]

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@poshboutique2 wrote:

Despite the rather trivial justifications being given for the charge

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They are providing an extra service, people value it enough to choose to use it, it costs them money to deliver, it saves the customers money in making a journey - that's a fairly reasonable basis for charging.

I can however understand why you would want it to continue to be bundled into the product cost so the cost of delivering it are spread across all product customers including those of us who do not use the service however if they didn't start recovering for this service then the price of the products would likely have gone up even more.