Skip main navigation
Home > Customer Service > Terms and Conditions > Compensation and delivery >

Changes to Royal Mail terms and conditions

We are making a number of changes to our terms and conditions.

All changes are effective from 2nd April 2012 apart from the 'Deliver to Neighbour' trial which has been running since 28th November 2011.

These updated terms and conditions supersede any previous agreements or arrangements between us.

 

Improved portfolio of products for advertisers, publishers and businesses sending general correspondence

April 2012 sees the launch of an improved portfolio of products that are more accessible, simpler to understand and easier to use. We have simplified and re-organised our products for advertisers, publishers and businesses sending general correspondence into just five products. Each has options to fulfil your mailing requirements:

  • Advertising Mail™ – for all your marketing needs
  • Sustainable® Advertising Mail – reducing the environmental impact of your marketing
  • Publishing Mail – for publications and periodicals
  • Business Mail 1st Class – for urgent general correspondence including bills / statements
  • Business Mail – for general correspondence including bills / statements

On Monday 2nd April, depending on what services you use, we may be simply renaming a product or we may be changing the specifications or adding more options. In some cases, we will be realigning products and providing suitable alternatives.

Key changes

  • Lower entry levels on many sorted products – entry level is now standardised at 4,000 letters or 1,000 large letters or packets. This makes many of our contract products more accessible to your business.
  • Reduced number of sortation levels – to simplify our offer there are now only two levels of sortation across the entire sorted product portfolio, instead of five.
  • Faster delivery – we have reviewed our delivery speeds for sorted mail, to better meet your requirements. We are aiming to provide you with a narrower window of delivery, which will give you a much better idea of when your mail will arrive.
  • More choice – a machine-readable large letter specification, as well as increasing the range of Advertising Mail™ options.


For further details, please speak to your Account Manager or find out more about these products.

The following terms and conditions have been updated to reflect these changes:

 

Changes to International Contract services

Our Contract specific terms and conditions allow us to surcharge you if you do not achieve the minimum spend requirement. The surcharge will now be either the difference between the amount paid and what you would have paid if you had used the next cheapest alternative service available or the difference between the amount paid and the minimum spend requirement, whichever is lower.

  • We will have the ability to apply a surcharge on 14 days notice for sudden, unplanned changes to our cost base such as changes to security regulations which mean we have to undertake extra screening of items. This is to cover our exposure to the volatility of the export market.
  • International High Volume services: the minimum selection quantities increase for Letters increase from 25 to 50 items and for Flats from 5 to 10 items.
  • Destination Sort: Customers mailing to the USA using Destination Sort Priority and Standard service speeds are no longer required to despatch items over 500gms separately from the rest of their mail, making sorting mail quicker and easier. This will result in just one item and kg price for all traffic to the USA.
  • Airsure: we now offer a fully tracked service to Australia, Latvia and Malta.
  • International Signed For: this now has full end-to-end tracking to the following 20 destinations, offering greater peace of mind and visibility of your item through to delivery:
Austria* Japan 
Belgium Luxembourg
Canada Malta 
Denmark* Netherlands 
Finland New Zealand
France  Poland* 
Germany*  Singapore 
Hong Kong  Slovakia 
Hungary  Sweden 
Ireland  Switzerland 

*For these countries, you can see the name of the person that has signed for the item electronically.

 

Special Delivery™ 9:00am – extension to guaranteed time

Our delivery promise is to deliver your Special Delivery™ 9:00am items by 9:00am. However, we know that at some addresses no-one is available before 9:00am to receive and sign for the item. In these instances, it is inconvenient for both the sender and the receiving customer if we have successfully attempted delivery of the item before 9:00am, but the receiving customer misses the delivery because they are not there to receive and sign for it. 

Therefore, to make it easier for urgent items to reach their destination as soon as possible, where we know from previous experience of an address that no-one is likely to be available to receive an item before 9:00 am, we are extending the delivery window by 30 minutes. Where this is the case, items delivered between 9:00am and 9:30am will now be classified as a successful delivery and no refund will be due. We are making this change to be flexible and meet the needs of your receiving customers in locations which cannot be accessed before 9:00am.

 

Changes to Royal Mail Tracked® and Tracked™ Next Day Specific Terms

  • Because we know you value a greater degree of stability to pricing of Tracked products, from 2nd April a pricing review will be triggered only if your profile price increases from your original agreement by more than 10% (or 5% if the impact of the change is valued at over £500,000). This will replace the current quarterly review of pricing.
  • To make the service more cost reflective, we will be increasing the price of the optional signature from 25p to 30p.
  • The Tracked and Tracked Next Day specific terms (PDF, 114kb) have been updated to reflect this change.

 

Minimum order value

We will no longer be charging a minimum order value on orders placed via your Online Business Account (currently £5) and posting cheques (currently £20).
For more information, see minimum order value

The following terms and conditions have been updated to reflect this change:

 

Paper posting cheques

To better reflect the costs involved in handling them, the handling fee for paper posting cheques will increase from £1 to £10 plus VAT. Please note that paper posting cheques can still be used with Standard Account, Packetpost, Packetsort, International Non Contract services (Airmail and Surface Mail) and Special Delivery™. For more information, see posting cheques.

 

Withdrawal of Bulk Mail Compensation Scheme

To bring our compensation policies in line with those of some other delivery companies, we are removing compensation for delay on the following non-time guaranteed services: Standard Tariff on Account (STL PPI), Cleanmail®, Response Services, Mailsort®, Advertising Mail™, Advertising Mail™ Light, Walksort®, Presstream®, Automated Standard Tariff Large Letter, mailmedia®, Sustainable® Mail, Big Book and Royal Mail Heavyweight.

Customers who are sending urgent or time-sensitive mail should use a time guaranteed service such as Special Delivery™.

The existing scheme states that we will pay customers a percentage of their postage costs in credit as compensation for delay if we miss our high annual Quality of Service targets by more than 1%. We are proud that our Quality of Service is such that we have not had to pay compensation pertaining to the scheme since 2006.

The following terms and conditions have been updated to reflect this change:

 

1st and 2nd Class (account payment channel)

We have introduced a new payment channel for 1st and 2nd Class items - by account. Like the other payment channels - stamps, online and franking - this service does not offer any discounts for volume or presentation and it is exempt from VAT.

To access this service simply use the new product code ‘BPL’, available on your Online Business Account system from 2nd April. Please also note that you can continue to use your current PPI Licence and envelope/label stock. There is no need for any changes to your posting procedures. 

The terms and conditions below have been updated to reflect this change. Please note that we will also publish these updated terms in the London, Edinburgh and Belfast Gazettes, as we are legally required to do, in advance of the changes taking effect.

 

Extension of Delivery to Neighbour trial

Since the end of November 2011 Royal Mail has been running a trial giving customers in the 6 trial areas quicker and more convenient access to mail we’ve not been able to deliver. Delivery to Neighbour is part of our ongoing programme to increase options for convenient delivery. It enables us to deliver items which are too large for the letter box to a neighbour, if the recipient is out.

We will evaluate the experience, but based on the positive feedback from customers so far, we will be extending the trial in the 6 areas until the end of May 2012, so that you can continue to benefit from this.

Special Delivery™ and deliveries from overseas which require a signature will remain excluded from the trial and taken back to the local Royal Mail depot in the normal way.

For more information including areas involved in the trial and how to opt out should you not wish to participate, see Delivery to Neighbour.
 

Paperwork on collection

Please be reminded that when mailing on account you are required to hand over the correct documentation with every collection. To ensure that your collections run smoothly, by having the right documentation ready for your driver, please see paperwork on collection.

 

Changes to products for users of Royal Mail franking services

Cleanmail becomes Business Mail - We have simplified and re-organised our products and Cleanmail is changing its name to Business Mail. It’s still simple, continues to offer the same great savings and is the ideal choice if you are posting over 500 letters a day through your franking machine and can separate mail by class. To continue using our soon-to-be Business Mail products through Royal Mail franking services, please make sure you are already using a SMART franking machine. If not, we advise you to upgrade as soon as you can to ensure an uninterrupted service.

For an update of the new selections for Business Mail and how to buy them on your machine see our Franking section.

International Signed For™ can now be tracked end-to-end to over 20 destinations worldwide offering greater peace of mind and visibility of your item through to delivery. When used in conjunction with Airmail, tracking is included at the point of acceptance; at the point of UK despatch; at the point of arrival overseas and on delivery/attempted delivery.

For more information, see International Signed For™.

Top tips to avoid incurring unnecessary fees and charges

  1. Update the prices in your machine – The Legal Scheme for Franking Letters and Parcels (2008) states that customers’ equipment must display the correct prices at all times. Make sure you contact your supplier/manufacturer to get your tariff chip or prices download organised before the new prices go live. Having the right prices in your equipment ensures you never run the risk of underpaying and you will therefore save yourself an administration fee of £0.80 per mail piece plus the underpayment amount on each item.
  2. Service your machine annually - Make sure your machine is in peak condition by organising an annual inspection for your franking machine in line with The Legal Scheme for Franking Letters and Parcels 2008 and your Royal Mail Licence to frank mail.
  3. Refunds for incorrect prints - We recognise that mistakes are made, so our easy solution to an incorrectly printed franking impression is to refund the amount to you, less a 15% charge of the total value to cover administration costs. This change comes into effect in line with our new prices.

For more information, see the Franking scheme for letters and parcels or the product terms and conditions.

 

Terms and conditions changes from January 2012

For information relating to VAT on Mailsort 1 & 2 1400 from 6th December 2011, please visit www.royalmail.com/vat.

We have received permission from our regulator to make a number of changes to reflect the reality of today's postal market. The changes bring our terms and conditions more in line with other delivery companies.

The updated terms and conditions supersede any previous agreements or arrangements between us.

The terms and conditions documents below have been updated to reflect the changes:

All changes are effective from 9th January 2012.

 

Holding period for items we cannot deliver

If we are unable to deliver an item and the recipient does not arrange to have it redelivered, we will hold it at their local delivery office for a standard period of 18 days before we return it to the sender, where possible. This represents a change from seven days for Recorded Signed For items, 14 days for Royal Mail Tracked and 21 days for Special Delivery and all other services. This change makes it simpler for recipients to know how long they have to collect their item from us, if we haven’t been able to deliver it to their address.

 

From To When
Undeliverable items are kept at the Delivery Office for customers to collect before being returned to the sender for:
7 days: Recorded Signed For
14 days: Royal Mail Tracked
21 days: All other services		 All undeliverable items will be kept at our Delivery Office for 18 days (unless redelivery is arranged). 9th January 2012

 

Proof of delivery and refunds

We are introducing a three-month time limit from the date of posting for proof of delivery requests to Royal Mail Customer Services for Recorded Signed For™ and Special Delivery services, replacing the previous 12-month period. Customers will have three months to request a refund if we are unable to provide proof of delivery. You can still view proof of delivery on the Royal Mail website for up to 12 months after posting, but after 3 months from the date of posting you will still not be eligible for a fee refund should you find we didn’t get proof of delivery.

 

From To When
Customers have 12 months to request proof of delivery (Recorded Signed For and Special Delivery) from Royal Mail Customer Services or online. Customers will have 3 months to request Proof of Delivery directly from customer services (still 12 months online). 9th January 2012
No time limit specified in our terms and conditions for requesting a fee refund in the event of failure to prove delivery, but 12 months has become standard practice 3 months to request a fee refund in the event of Royal Mail’s failure to get Proof of Delivery 9th January 2012

 

Making a compensation claim

Claims relating to loss or damage of items sent within the UK must be made within 80 calendar days of the date of posting. This replaces the previous term of 12 months and gives us a greater ability to find missing items and to identify causes of loss and damage. Claims relating to international services will continue to have a six-month claim period. As now, we will not accept claims until 15 days from the delivery due date have elapsed. We will pay compensation by crediting your Royal Mail account. We will also reserve the right to offset any outstanding debt you have with us, with any compensation we may owe you. Payment of compensation will only be made by cheque if a customer’s account has been closed.

 

From To When
Customers can submit a compensation claim up to 12 months after posting (6 months for international items). Customers must submit loss or damage compensation claims within 80 days from the date of posting (still 6 months for international items). 9th January 2012
Compensation is paid by crediting a customer’s account, but customers may request a cheque instead Compensation will paid by crediting a customer’s account and cheques will only be paid when an account has been closed. Royal Mail also reserves the right to offset compensation against outstanding customer debt 9th January 2012

 

Compensation for loss or damage of tracked items

Maximum compensation will no longer be linked to the value of a First Class stamp. Instead, maximum compensation for Royal Mail Tracked items will be £50. Standard compensation for International Signed For™ and Airsure® will also be £50 for contract customers, and enhanced compensation will remain available with Special Delivery, International Signed For and Airsure.

 

From To When
Tracked items (Royal Mail Tracked, International Signed For and Airsure) are eligible for loss or damage compensation of up to 100 times the value of a first class stamp. (Enhanced compensation is available with International Signed For and Airsure). Tracked items will be eligible for up to £50 loss or damage compensation. (Enhanced compensation will continue to be available with International Signed For, Airsure and Special Delivery - Special Delivery compensation arrangements will not change). 9th January 2012

 

Packetpost and Packetsort compensation for delay

Customers using Packetpost and Packetsort will no longer be eligible for compensation for delay under the bulk mail compensation scheme for delay. Customers will continue to be eligible for delay compensation for other services currently in the scheme, and our Special Delivery service also offers compensation for delay.

 

From To When
Packetpost and Packetsort are eligible for bulk mail compensation for delay. Packetpost and Packetsort will not be eligible for delay compensation. 9th January 2012

 

Bulk Mail compensation for delay

Compensation for loss or damage of untracked contract items

We will no longer pay compensation for the loss or damage of items sent using contract services that do not include a tracking element. This includes both domestic and international services, and is in line with industry standards. Compensation is still available for loss or damage of stamped and franked items, and tracked services (Special Delivery, Royal Mail Tracked, International Signed For and Airsure). The range of packet services we offer gives you a choice of delivery speeds, tracking capability and levels of compensation. This change does not affect stamped and franked services.

 

From To When
Loss and damage compensation of up to 100 x the value of a 1st class stamp on all services. No loss or damage compensation available with untracked contract services. 9th January 2012

 

Compensation for loss or damage of untracked non-contract items

From 30th April the maximum compensation available for loss or damage for untracked services such as customers who send items using untracked services such as 1st Class or 2nd Class (including when used with Recorded Signed For™), Standard Parcels, Articles for the Blind, Airmail and Surface Mail will be up to a maximum £46.00. Compensation is on the basis of actual loss, where evidence of posting and value can be provided. Enhanced compensation will no longer be available to purchase with Standards Parcels.

 

From To When
Loss and damage compensation of up to 100 x the value of a 1st class stamp on all services. Loss or damage compensation available with untracked non-contract services up to a maximum of £46.00. Evidence of posting and value must be provided. 30th April 2012
Enhanced compensation available at time of purchase at an additional cost for Standard Parcels for £100, £250 or £500. No enhanced compensation available to purchase. Compensation cover up to a maximum of £46.00. Evidence of posting and value must be provided. 30th April 2012

 

Compensation for loss or damage of International tracked non -contract items 

From 30th April the standard compensation available for loss or damage for International Signed For™ and Airsure® will no longer be linked to the value of a First Class stamp. Standard compensation for both tracked services will be £50 with enhanced compensation remaining available to purchase. Compensation is on the basis of actual loss, where evidence of posting and value can be provided.

 

From To When

Tracked international items (International Signed For™ and Airsure®)  eligible for standard loss and damage compensation of up to 100 times the value of a first class stamp. Enhanced compensation available to purchase

Tracked international items (International Signed For™ and Airsure®) will be eligible for up to £50 standard loss and damage compensation. Enhanced compensation will continue to be available.

 30th April 2012
Print Page