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Online giant Amazon dumps Royal Mail

Thursday 8th October 2009

Online retailer Amazon, Royal Mail’s second largest customer, has cancelled its long-running partnership as another wave of strikes threaten to worsen service ahead of the pre-Christmas rush.

Amazon plans to use Royal Mail rival Home Delivery Network to get its goods out instead.

The lost deal is expected to cost Royal Mail in the region of GBP 25m.

The news comes ahead of another national strike announcement from the Communication Worker’s Union, following the local strikes, which have already heavily disrupted post deliveries around the country.

Royal Mail’s swingeing modernisation programme has angered unions who say they fear giving way now will lead to far more disruption to customer service in the future.

"The scale of change planned..is frightening," said the union.

The backlog of undelivered post has already put small business and internet retailers, under strain and has drawn fire from eBay users with long delays putting their trading credentials at risk.

View Comments 24 comments

Posted By Mr John Smith on Monday 10th May 2010 07:27:32
useless jobshy lazy workers. get out of RM and get a real job where you can't strike every time you don't agree with something that your company or boss does. lazy "head in the clouds" public sector workers.

Posted By JJ on Wednesday 11th November 2009 08:21:41
No wonder RM can't deliver stuff on time or to the correct address. Judging by some of the postings on here, most of the RM staff can't read or write !

Posted By Tishal on Monday 19th October 2009 04:27:13
I'm deeply sorry for Adam crozier, there's NO BONUS this year

Posted By Plstr on Monday 19th October 2009 04:16:34
The RM chief executive wage is £15.000 a week and part time employed his bonus last year was around on million for hitting the target and making extra profit for the company I've got nothing else to say judge it for ur self if u r smart....

Posted By Tl on Monday 19th October 2009 04:01:49
I bet all these people moaning about the postman having to protect his job r signing the dole or on job seekers allowances

Posted By To on Monday 19th October 2009 03:48:36
Wait and c when a private company take over RM you will pay £1.50 and £2.50 for a 2nd class stamp, all this people don't know what's going on.... Don't know about the RM chief executive and the managers directors bonuses, the majority of the British public r against the poor postie stricking for his rights. it is not because people r loosing their jobs, postman has too

Posted By Yan on Sunday 11th October 2009 09:51:38
Changing from Royal mail will not necessarily mean that it won't be delivered by RM. Many delivery companies use RM to deliver their items from door to door, because the regulators give them cheap offers to use RM. So many of those will be effected by the RM strike.

Posted By David Gallacher on Friday 9th October 2009 12:32:46
In this day with people looking for full time employment these idiots decide to make the people who pay their wages suffer. What happened when crown employee's wer'nt allowed to strike. What next hopefully the same will apply to our servicemen. If the RM can perform then it's time for private enterprize to take over.

Posted By N Brice on Friday 9th October 2009 10:09:49
I enjoy working as a Postie and i dont winge all day cos its an easy job that keeps me fit and healthy,i am always friendly and polite to customers including the rude ones of which there are many,i also do my best for the company.I am not a union member as i dont believe in unions in the same way i dont believe in the labour govt.There are some retarded people who think that everybody working for the RM is at fault for these strikes.I dont want to strike as i think in the current economic crisis its ridiculous in the same way its ridiculous when nurses and firemen strike its stupid.The biggest problem is that the goverment want to run the RoyalMail as a profit making business,the Royal Mail must always remain a public service and as a result it should not have to worry about competing with other companies and making money.If the royal mail runs at a loss then the govt can foot the bill.The NHS,Local Councils and schools are not told to run as profit making businesses they run at a loss to provide a service.If the royal mail was privatised or went out of business,then how unsafe would it be to have the uk's mail service run by a private foreign owned company.I couldn't imagine having a postal service that the public had no control over.

Posted By Arletty on Friday 9th October 2009 09:54:49
The behaviour of the idiots (anarchists?) employed in RM and their unions is unfortunately to be expected and should have been foreseen. What other employer would allow such a scruffy bunch to rule the roost and represent what should be a smart-imaged public service? In their long shorts( or short longs!) with their unkempt long hair etc they put me in mind of European police, who whilst toting their guns are allowed, incredibly, to SMOKE in the streets. Disgusting, downgrading and disgraceful. The RM management have not grasped nettles in the past and are now reaping their rewards! Public carriers are always on time, polite, helpful and SMART - more power to their elbow says I.

Posted By Paul Platten on Thursday 8th October 2009 04:49:22
We are a medium sized EBAY business sending out 140+ orders per day. We rely on Royal Mail. With an average package size of 400g its not viable to use any other carrier. The reality is that the management have not a clue how to modernise the mail service. Its no wonder the staff are unhappy

Posted By postdelayed.com on Thursday 8th October 2009 04:16:09
i work for rm and am very hard working i dont want to strike and cant afford to strike tho it looks like I WILL BE FORCED TO,rm service is worse now than ever before changes made by the people at the top who have never done the job adam crozier got 3m bonus for his efforts in running rm 3m for ruining the business and putting alot of people out of a job the staff some good some bad have no other option i have a morg and rm have offered me £11,000 to go part time which i refuse if the strikes dont happen my contract will be changed then who will pay my morg and feed my kids and i have worked hard for rm,but as some people on here are more worried about their lawns,its the same old public crap i feel sorry for small businesses because royal mail doesn,t care about you

Posted By mark on Thursday 8th October 2009 03:54:09
We have had some terrible experiences with Royal Mail. We complained once and my wife received abuse on our door step from a put out RM delivery driver with our next delivery (how's that for customer service?!). As an Amazon prime member this news is excellent, Royal Mail should stick to letters and leave the parcels to dedicated delivery firms that actually value the business.

Posted By Sue P on Thursday 8th October 2009 03:12:44
The only problems with Royal Mail are their unions and the post men and women who will eventually be responsible for their downfall. I hope the Royal Mail unions and staff responsible realise what losing Amazon business will mean to the future of Royal Mail. If you lose your jobs you will only have yourselves to blame.

Posted By Suky B on Thursday 8th October 2009 03:04:47
The only good thing Royal Mail did was to stop the postmen walking across my lawn everyday after I complained to Royal Mail.

Posted By suky B on Thursday 8th October 2009 03:01:39
Royal mail should have predicted their company's downfall many years ago with the advent of email, who needs postage stamps to send letters when you can send them for free via email.

Posted By Kayjay on Thursday 8th October 2009 02:54:47
Best news yet that Amazon has pulled the plug on Royal Mail. Dinosaurs are extinct; let's hope RM will be and soon.

Posted By Jane on Thursday 8th October 2009 02:08:03
Now that Amazon has pulled the plug, it's highly likely that staff will lose their jobs. Their own fault. Just get on with your job and be thankful you have a job in these hard times. Your strikes have put people out of business, and jobs have been lost. Now you may lose yours. Well deserved.

Posted By Chas Rice on Thursday 8th October 2009 02:07:27
Off to buy another fax machine. With BACs, email, fax and a good private courier we should be able to manage without RM. The RM management must also take some of the hit on this one. They too have not truly considered to needs of their customer base over the years. Our post lady says she is going to be strapped for funds. The workforce may have been ill advised by their union chiefs. Winners and Losers ... such a familiar pattern of events. We could have written the script!

Posted By Peter Maddams on Thursday 8th October 2009 01:41:01
If the postal workers want to focus Royal Mails minds then instead of striking and not getting paid they should simply tell the public they intend to deliver letters and parcels that have not been stamped i.e. free of charge. This way the postal workers still get paid, the public are happy and Royal Mail is the only one that suffers.

Posted By J Rea on Thursday 8th October 2009 01:34:39
I've had an ongoing problem with RM for years of misdelivered items through my letter box & items never delivered. This is now effecting my business...I am noe preparec to pay more for a service that I can rely upon...can't operate on a" wing & a prayer" any longer. I'm still waiting on business cheques that were posted 18th & 21stSeptember...that have still yet to arrive. My business is being bled dry in the meantime. Another case of the unions holding the country to ransom. Ludite mentality is short lived...as you will eventually fall on your sword!! Your inability to reason with an ever changing world will cost you & us dearly!!

Posted By p pullen on Thursday 8th October 2009 01:23:36
it s about time this not good for customers i am still waiting for cheques if i dont get them by next tuesday i am to closed down my company with lost of 5 staff r m are taking the xxxx and fed up with there strikes cheques are amounts of £65.000 in cqes R M SHOULD SACK THERE STAFF

Posted By James on Thursday 8th October 2009 01:18:33
Well done Amazon. The royal mail offer service typical of all the former state owned companies, i.e. no service at all. See BT for further proo. Bad practices and a lack of customer focus lead to poor customer service time and again and it's extremely gratifying that Amazon are showing the royal mail that this cannot continue. As an online retailer, I fight daily against the perception of poor service offered by my business as a result of the current 1 in 5 items sent by post being lost. They then take 7 months to compensate and frequently offer far less than the value of items sent, knowing that we have no choice but to accept. As soon as a viable alternative to the royal mail becomes available, customers will leave in their millions

Posted By Margaret Nicholls on Thursday 8th October 2009 01:16:45
HOORAY its about time too.With all the trouble I have had with RM there should be a GREAT improvement.............