Royal Mail can trace its roots back to Henry VIII and the early 1500's but wasn't made available to the general serfs until about the middle of the 1630's by Charles the First and back then all postage was paid by the recipient. (Wouldn't be a bad idea bringing that back.)
Its gone through many transitions since then, from officially being the Post Office/GPO and in more recent times when the Bean Counters decided a rebrand was needed and changed the name to Consignia then Consignia Holdings and in one of the most expensive rebrands in British History albeit close to the same as when Burtons the high street clothing store decided to upbrand itself to Burton, losing the "s" with at least the latter not fucking around and sticking to there guns, the ideas men behind Consignia went back to Royal Mail.
Its comes as no surprise that being Government owned the P.O. haemoraged some major money over this fiasco, sorry, should read, "We" the tax payer did.
However, over the years we have been the envy of many a country with our fablulous postal system.
But that time is coming to an end slowly but surely.
In true 21st century Britain style were running it blindly into the ground, along with our badly run over priced Rail system.
Yesterday I sent a few parcels at the Post Office to some friends around the U.K. and was taken aback by a few of the options given to me, but the one that got my arse out the most was Insurance. Yes, Insurance.
In 2004 Royal Mail lost 14 plus Million letters and so many parcels they lost count.
How? How does such a well oiled machine lose that much mail? That many parcels?
It beggars belief.
"Whats the value of the item?" said the clerk.
"Well, about £150 in each parcel" i replied.
"You'll want insurance for those then?"
"Why?" i replied with a sarcastic tint.
"Well, just in case they get damaged or lost"
"Lost?"
"Could get lost in the post mate".
"Sorry," i replied, " your not exactly suggesting you may lose my parcels are you?"
"Well, happens more than you think".
"How?" i said in disbelief, hopefully not letting on that I already knew the answer.
"I dunno", he said. "They just get lost".
" As a matter of interest, will the parcels be delivered or will the recipients just get a note to pick the parcel up at the depot whether they are in or not?"
"Dont know what you mean sir."
"Thought you wouldn't".
So, the same company that not only didn't gear up for the online postal revolution, who unlike every other postal service on the planet or private delivery company didn't ensure it's longevity by taking steps to move with the times also loses parcels it's charged with delivering?
How shit is that?
Would this have happened if this was a privately owned company? Would it fuck.
Do we the consumer pay twice through tax and then postage fees because the Royal Mail is run by inept arseholes? Of course we do.
Do we entrust our parcels to be delivered even though Royal Mail still continues to employ unvetted, light fingered temps? Again of course we do.
Mainly because we have no choice.
However, in the near future dont be surprised to see your postman wearing an Orange uniform, TNT are thinking of moving into a lot of Royal Mails markets and admits it currently uses RM for some of its last mile deliveries.
And, on a final note, Her Madge might want to think about removing it's Royal Charter, lets face it, I dont think she'd want to be associated with such a bunch of idiotic trades union men and light fingered thieving cunts. Do you?
