Over the weekend, Royal Mail started to clear the international backlog of parcels which have been sitting going no where for a week. Since the incident which started as early as Tuesday, but was made public on Wednesday last week, nothing has moved so there is a considerable international backlog of parcels to work through.
Royal Mail also managed to restart the export of parcels from Northern Ireland to Ireland. Customers in Northern Ireland can now export parcels bound for Ireland into Northern Ireland Post Office branches. However these services are currently only available for customers based in Northern Ireland. They are not available for customers based in Great Britain where export restrictions continue to apply.
Royal Mail are still not in a position to accept international parcels and request customers not to inject new parcels into their network and add to the international backlog.
Royal Mail continues to work with external experts, the security authorities and regulators to mitigate the impact of this cyber incident, with a focus on restoring all services for export letters and parcels. Our import operations continue to perform a full service with some minor delays. Domestic services remain unaffected.
We’re sorry for any disruption this incident may be causing. Our teams are continuing to work around the clock to resolve this situation. We will update customers as soon as we have more information.
– Royal Mail
In the mean time, the agreed negotiations with ACAS ended on Friday and if you check the CWU Twitter account today it’s littered with images of local Delivery Offices with Royal Mail workers pledging to vote ‘Yes’ at the next strike ballot – the dispute has been going on so long that a fresh mandate is needed for further strike action, likely to be confirmed in February.
In more bad news of the company, Royal Mail boss CEO is likely to be hauled back in front of MPS and accused of misleading the Parliamentary Select Committee for his evasive and obstructive answers to their last inquisition.
Finally, it’s reported that several major Royal Mail investors will meet with the CWU, although apparently not Vesa and Daniel Kretinsky who own 23% of the business. If Simon Thompson is ousted, who would want to take on what is perhaps currently the most toxic job in the UK?
One Response
It’s only a toxic job because the way Thompson has handled it.
Yes, RM needs to modernise and adapt, but you do that by taking your workforce with you, which most businesses manage to do, not by tearing up an agreed path to discuss such changes. The man tore this up without even trying to use the agreed channels. Especially given the well known militant nature of the CWU. It was obviously going to lead to a civil war within RM.
The majority of posties I have met are decent and hardworking. Why is it that boards always claim they need to pay well to recruit the “right” people, but won’t extend that principle to their general workforce, where the opposite applies?
It’s also clear that RM is not delivering at any level under Thompson’s watch. Regulatory targets are now treated with contempt and most caller offices still have ridiculously short covid era opening hours.
Our local office is open 2 hours a day, from 8-10am with dozens queuing from half seven each morning.
The evasive appearance in front of a parliamentary committee showed exactly what he is. Would you want your business in this man’s hands?
RM was an ideal target for the hackers as well, a sprawling, under-invested company. Their online services are about 50/50 in terms of functionality as it is.
Even shareholders now seem to have realised he is not up to the job.
No doubt Thompson will be paid off and will take his wrecking ball to another hapless company.
There has been a steady decline in the calibre of management at RM. They need someone of real quality to come in who recognises the challenges and understands how to meet them without destroying the business.