The Royal Mail will increase the value of stamps once more subsequent month as the corporate struggles with a decline within the variety of letters being posted.
The value of a firstclass and second class stamp will enhance by 10p to £1.35 and 85p respectively from 2 April.
It comes after Royal Mail raised the price of stamps twice in 2023.
A yr in the past, a firstclass stamp price 95p earlier than being hiked to £1.10 in April. The value was elevated once more to £1.25 six months later.
Chief business officer Nick Landon stated: “We all the time think about value adjustments very fastidiously however we face a scenario the place letter volumes have diminished dramatically over latest years whereas prices have elevated.
“It is no longer sustainable to maintain a network built for 20 billion letters when we are now only delivering seven billion.”
He added: “As a result of letter volume decline, our posties now have to walk more than three times as far to deliver the same number of letters as before, increasing the delivery costs per letter.”
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It comes after regulator Ofcom launched a session right into a proposed shake-up of the Royal Mail’s Universal Service Obligation, and instructed the agency could possibly be allowed to reduce its letter deliveries to 3 or 5 days per week.
The Communication Workers Union warned that the final result of the evaluation was “predetermined” and that cuts to Royal Mail’s letter supply service might result in tens of hundreds of job losses.
Ofcom’s session is because of finish in April.
The Royal Mail, which is owned by International Distributions Services, recorded a £419m loss in its earlier monetary yr.
It was additionally fined £5.6m in 2023 for lacking supply targets.
Source: information.sky.com”