Redfern Business Travel - Disruption To Postal Services

Disruption To Postal Services

Sunday, 27 September 2009 12:58

Royal Mail - Disruption To Postal Services

As you will be aware, there is a planned ballot for strike action amongst postal workers in the near future, and there has, for a number of weeks, been reported disruption to postal services across the country.

Redfern Travel has been monitoring the situation closely, and whilst there have been isolated instances of delayed delivery of travel tickets, we are not seeing any significant impact overall.

We are conscious however, that the situation is only likely to deteriorate over the coming weeks and in light of this, we are suggesting to all our clients that this is considered when selecting the delivery method for rail tickets. Even if you have a ticket printer on site, there may be instances when postal delivery is required.

When booking tickets, we would suggest that:

1. Bookings are made as far in advance as possible. This not only reduces the risk of tickets arriving too late for travel, but is also likely to reduce the ticket cost
2. If travel is within five working days of booking, consider whether First Class post is the best delivery option, or whether an alternative method would be preferable.
3. Consider whether ticket on departure (collection of the ticket from a FastTicket machine prior to departure) might be more suitable.
a. Please note that there is a supplement for tickets on departure, but it is much less than the costs incurred for enhanced mail delivery services.
b. In order to take advantage of ticket on departure you will need this option to be switched on within your organisation's set up on RedfernOnlineRail. If ticket on departure is not currently available, please contact your Redfern business travel centre who can arrange this for you.
4. If ticket on departure is not suitable, the only way delivery can be guaranteed is by using Royal Mail's Special Delivery service. Special Delivery can be requested online during the booking process if this option has been set up for your organisation. Alternatively, please contact your Redfern business travel centre who can arrange Special Delivery or can add this option to your system set up. Please note, the cost of Special Delivery will be charged.

To clarify Royal Mail's stance on delivery services, whilst the aim is to deliver First Class mail on the next working day, Royal Mail cannot guarantee this. The only guaranteed service is Special Delivery. Please note also that, once Redfern Travel has despatched the ticket, we can accept no responsibility for the performance of Royal Mail in delivering that ticket.

Going forward, we are preparing ourselves for the possible impact of an all-out postal strike, and are currently investigating ways in which we can overcome the potential problems we will all encounter if strike action goes ahead. Options include the use of a privately operated delivery service, and we will keep you informed if we find it necessary to introduce alternative delivery methods. Let's hope it doesn't come to that.

Further information on service disruption and the latest on industrial action can be read on the Royal Mail's website at www.royalmail.com

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