Jasmine relies on this post for medical appointments for her children.
Jasmine Moulton's children have a series of complex medical conditions. Five-year-old Harper's skin allergies have gotten so bad that some days we have to bandage her body. Joshua, 3, has trouble breathing and swallowing. Both require regular hospital check-ups.
The NHS Trust will contact Jasmine about her medical appointment by letter. But in recent months, these letters have been delayed or not delivered at all.
In early January, Jasmine received a call from the hospital informing her that not only had both her children missed their appointments, but Joshua had also missed his surgery, which was due to take place in late December.
“And I was like, 'Please forgive me?'” “And I was a little shocked. I explained that there was no post, and she seemed shocked,” Jasmine said. says.
As Jasmine speaks, Joshua, who has a chest infection, lies on the couch next to her. He coughs and wheezes. They hoped that the surgery he was unable to undergo might help him swallow.
“It's very frustrating. Besides being a mother of two children…” Jasmine couldn't finish her sentence and started crying. She is clearly exhausted.
“I get stressed out every day just thinking about how many other appointments I've missed. And I just don't know when I'll be able to move on. And watching him suffer… I am doing it.”
Royal Mail said it was “unacceptable” that the NHS letter was not delivered and apologized to the family.
Jenny Hall, the company's director of corporate affairs, said: “I have young children myself and I know it has been stressful.”
Royal Mail: Where is my post?
For more on this article, watch Panorama on Monday 26 February at 20:00 GMT on BBC One and then on BBC iPlayer.
Reporter Zoe Conway speaks to Royal Mail insiders about internal issues and hears from Royal Mail management about how proposed changes could help avoid multi-million pound losses. listen.
Four miles from Jasmine's home in Cheshire is Royal Mail's Winsford depot. On a weekday morning in early February, people gathered one after another to pick up undelivered letters.
A woman recovering from cancer was worried she had missed a letter from the NHS, saying: 'I have an appointment scheduled for next month and if I miss it it could be life-threatening. ” he said.
Another woman said she received a birthday card from her grandmother, who was upset when she heard it didn't arrive on time. “She lives in Wales, but I don't see her much,” she said.
Royal Mail said it would investigate what was going on at the Winsford delivery station as a “priority”.
But Cheshire isn't the only county where Royal Mail is struggling to deliver. Second class letters, currently priced at 75p, should arrive within three working days. First class post costs £1.25 and arrives the next working day. Ten years ago, 92% of first-class mail arrived on time. By the end of last year, that proportion had fallen to 74%, according to regulator Ofcom.
In some places, the situation can be even worse. From June to September 2023, more than one-third of all first-class mail was delayed in 17 zip codes. In November, Ofcom fined Royal Mail £5.6 million for failing to meet its targets.
I didn't receive a letter about 3-year-old Joshua's surgery.
Under what is known as the Universal Service Obligation, Royal Mail is required by law to deliver letters to all addresses in the UK six days a week and parcels five days a week.
However, former and current Royal Mail employees told BBC Panorama that while parcels and tracked items were prioritized for delivery, letters were sometimes left stranded in sorting offices.
Over the past two decades, the number of letters we send has decreased, but at the same time the volume of parcels has increased significantly, largely due to the boom in online shopping. Parcel delivery is important to customers and represents an expanding business opportunity.
One former Royal Mail regional manager, who retired in 2022 and asked not to be named, said the company was so short-staffed that it instructed postal staff to leave letters for weeks on end.
“We knew we were letting our customers down, but we couldn't hide it,” he says. These decisions were taken in consultation with managers, he added.
He also said that all delivery offices in the country collect data on what is delivered and what is not delivered every day, so letters are left stranded while goods are being tracked and some parcels are being shipped. He also said that senior management would have known about this.
The data was collated and sent back up the management team to the top of the company, he said. It is said that the heads of Royal Mail had no idea this was happening because “everyone higher up in the chain had reported those failures and insisted that this was our priority.” It was “impossible”.
Royal Mail says it is its job to ensure that all letters and parcels are delivered on time because that is its promise to its customers.
“Especially at certain times of the year or when there are resource issues, like Christmas, volumes can double. And logistically, there may be times when you need to move loads first. It shouldn't be a temporary thing.'' Of course. There should be no such instructions,” says Royal Mail's Jenny Hall.
Postal regulator Ofcom investigated the issue of parcel prioritization last year. The paper said it had found no evidence of an “organization-wide policy directed by Royal Mail's senior management” to prioritize parcels over letters during “normal business periods”.
However, the company said it was concerned about “insufficient control, visibility and oversight” by management regarding decision-making at delivery locations.
Not meeting delivery targets isn't the only challenge facing Royal Mail. It has also been making losses, with a loss of £419m last year.
Hundreds of millions of pounds could be saved if the requirement to deliver letters six days a week was eased, or if deliveries were allowed to take longer.
Ofcom has recently set out options for changes to the service, which it says it hopes will be discussed publicly.
Many people told the BBC they believed the Royal Mail was an important public service. The challenge is how to balance that with Royal Mail's need to increase profits.
