Quality of service

Under the conditions of its licence, Royal Mail is obliged to use all reasonable endeavours to meet certain "quality of service" standards covering a wide range of products, including First and Second Class mail, Special Delivery and certain bulk mail services.

Royal Mail is also obliged to perform to set standards in relation to collections from post boxes and deliveries to residential and commercial premises. Where deliveries are concerned, Royal Mail is also required to meet a target in respect of the percentage of mail that is correctly delivered.

Postcomm monitors Royal Mail's compliance with these standards and, if the company fails to meet them, we may consider investigating these failures. Ultimately, Postcomm can consider taking enforcement action - such as obliging Royal Mail to put matters right or imposing a financial penalty.

Royal Mail publishes quarterly performance figures and publishes quarterly quality of service reports on its website. The report for 2007/08 was released on the 30 May 2008.

Royal Mail operates a number of compensation schemes relating to both domestic and business mail. These provide for compensation in the form of stamps and/or money in the case of mail that is lost, damaged or delayed. More information on Royal Mail's compensation schemes (external website).  Postcomm has recently consulted on Royal Mail's compensation schemes (full list of related documents) and published a proposals document in December 2007. In June 2007, we agreed to Royal Mail's request to suspend its bulk mail compensation arrangements during industrial action.  Full list of documents relating to Royal Mail's quality of service.

  • Postcomm's series of downloadable factsheets includes a brief guide to our work on Royal Mail's quality of service.

Related documents 

1 September - news release 
Royal Mail performance monitoring investigation – final decision issued
1 September 2010 - decision document
 An investigation into Royal Mail's monitoring of Quality of Service performance measurement - decision document (pdf, 594KB)
1 September 2010 - responses
Communication Workers Union response (pdf, 151KB)
Consumer Focus response (pdf, 241KB)
Mail Competition Forum response (pdf, 23KB)
Royal Mail response (pdf, 158KB) 
17 February 2010 - 'minded to' decision document
An investigation into Royal Mail’s Monitoring of Quality of Service Performance Measurement - Postcomm’s “minded to” Decision - February 2010 (pdf, 491KB) 
31 July 2009 - investigation into quality of service monitoring
Postal Services Act 2000. Sections 22- 37. Licence granted to Royal Mail. Condition 4. Initial scope of Quality of Service investigation - July 2009 (pdf, 29KB)
14 August 2008 - decision letter to Royal Mail
 Financial implications of quality of service failure due to industrial action - 2008/09 (pdf, 222KB)
14 August 2008 - stakeholder issues
Summary of main issues raised by stakeholders in relation to Royal Mail’s request for relief from the financial implications of industrial action in 2008-09 and Postcomm’s responses (pdf, 20KB) 
14 August 2008 - Q and A
Q&A for publication of Postcomm’s decision on Royal Mail’s 2007-08 application for financial relief and its 2008-09 request (pdf, 18KB)
14 August 2008 - decision document
Royal Mail's application to suspend the Bulk Mail Compensation Scheme and adjust the C-factor for transformation-related industrial action in 2007/08 (pdf, 110KB)
1 May 2008 - news release
 Royal Mail submits its case on quality of service failures in 2007/08.
15 April 2008 - news release
 Royal Mail to present its case on quality of service failings at open meeting.
26 June 2007 - news release 
Royal Mail's request to suspend bulk mail compensation during industrial action.