Sorted: But collecting packages in Coulsdon just got that bit more difficult
In the latest blow to Coulsdon town centre, Royal Mail has decided to remove the evening collection facilities for letters and parcels that can’t be delivered.
Royal Mail says it has made the change “to keep pace with the changing behaviour of our customers”.
A notice of the revised opening hours was posted earlier this month, with just a few days’ notice of the shift in hours. From August 8, the office is open to the public only two hours most days (four hours on Saturdays!).
“This doesn’t help people who are at work all day,” one unimpressed Royal Mail customer told Inside Croydon.
Closing times: the Royal Mail notice in Coulsdon that went up earlier this month
Royal Mail is under increasing competition from private delivery firms including Amazon and Hermes, who use delivery banks at stations and garages that can be accessed 24 hours a day, or in deals with local shops, many of which are open from 7am until 11pm.
“Bit by bit, Coulsdon is being stripped of all sorts of public services, the kind of services which used to make it a place where people wanted to live and work.
“Royal Mail has suffered through poor management for decades, running down a once proud national institution. Are these opening hours in Coulsdon some kind of test of public opinion?
“It seems certain to shift more business into the hands of the private delivery firms.”
A Royal Mail spokesperson told Inside Croydon: “We understand the importance that some customers attach to Customer Service Points as one of a number of ways in which they can access our services.
“An increase in doorstep services such as Parcel Collect and Safeplace is helping us to enhance customer convenience and deliver more parcels first time. So to keep pace with the changing behaviour of our customers, we are amending the opening hours of CSPs at some locations, including reducing opening hours at the quiet times of the day in some cases.
“We have a range of options free-of-charge for customers who want to arrange for an item to be redelivered, which have become increasingly popular.”
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South Croydon sorting office have been operating the same two hour days for a while now, seems a bit like a race to the bottom at this stage. Fundamental change at RM is needed, and fast. Speaks volumes when you see something is due to be delivered by Royal Mail now and you think ‘Oh…’ rather than ‘Good’.
I was a Posty for 29years 9 months before privatisation I had seen service changes for example a service called the 739 where 3 attempts to deliver package to a home address. But since profit-driven privatisation service has deteriorated even further and prices increased, local delivery offices being closed, staff cuts since my day over 100,000 staff less and now an attack on Terms & Conditions of staff who care about you so maximum profits are made to pay shareholders the majority of which are either hedge funds or foreign companies
Where are the figures showing how many people collected in the evenings?
Many local commuters who use the evening pick-up times, on their way home, will find 8am too late to enable them to pick up an item on their way to work. If the office opened at 6:30 am, it would be different.
I recall that a few years ago, Royal Mail converted the rather charming little building (possibly once the postie bike store?) in the sorting office yard into the office where the public now come to to pick up items. Before that, I think there was a hatch in the back wall of the office, by the loading bays, where you could do the same.
Maybe, since opening the office in the yard, they have found out that staff waste a great deal of time to-ing and fro-ing from the main building, or that they tie up staff for too long sitting in the little building with not enough customers popping in ?
I wonder what the real reason is ?