'Royal Mail delays are costing my little bakery'

A baker says delays with the Royal Mail parcel service are "really frustrating" and leaving her out of pocket.

Sally Rees owns Wicked Cookies in Nuneaton and also a retail outlet, Snickerwoodles in Leamington Spa. Both businesses sell regular and themed cookies, with a mail-order option.

However, she said that although 80% of deliveries are made without issue, the situation has worsened over the past three months.

"In the last three days we've had our post collected, our parcels collected, but the tracking system shows that they haven't even made it to the depot and been checked in."

She said the firm used Royal Mail's Tracked 24 service, which aims to deliver packages in the next working day.

In a statement, Royal Mail spokesperson said: "We know how important it is that customers receive their parcels when expected.

"We encourage any customers with concerns about a particular item to contact us directly so we can look into it."

Rees opened Wicked Cookies in 2016 and then a retail shop in Leamington two years ago.

She said that they have used different couriers for their mail order deliveries and all have similar issues, but the problem with Royal Mail is the size of the organisation.

"Yes, you have an account manager, but honestly, they can't do anything.

"So for a little business like us, it's actually really frustrating because we don't have any power to have anybody look at it and go, 'Well, can you sort it out, please?'"

She also said that the frustration also affects her customers.

"If people are waiting for their cookies and they've paid for freshly baked cookies and they don't turn up, then obviously that's very frustrating for them.

"And then it makes us look bad."

Rees said that when orders are delayed, they re-bake orders for customers whose cookies have not arrived after two days, but she bears the cost.

However, she said that making a claim against Royal Mail is not worth it.

"If you're sending [something like] a mobile phone, it's really easy to put in a claim because it has a set cost, and you're not allowed to claim the retail price of that.

"When you're talking about ingredients like flour, eggs and butter and sugar, and the time it takes me to go online and fill in one of the claim forms, it doesn't allow for the cost of the packaging, the box, all the time we've spent baking them and all the rest of it; it's not covered."

A spokesperson for Royal Mail said: "When a business customer's item is lost, we offer compensation for the cost price of an item as well as the postage paid.

"With regards to tracking, the journey on the website should only update when we're advised by a business customer that a parcel is on its way to us, and then when it's in our network, ready for delivery, and when it's been delivered."

Rees' problems come as existing issues and complaints about the regular letter postal service in parts of Warwickshire continue.

Martin Saxby from Rugby said after publicity about delays with the local MP getting involved, deliveries were back to normal, operating three days a week.

But recently he said the mail service had gone back to "the bad old days".

"We've recently gone over two weeks without any delivery and then a whole bundle of mail just this week coming through."

He said he put in a complaint to Royal Mail but did not receive a response and said with Christmas coming up, he was having doubts about using Royal Mail and their new festive stamps when it comes to posting cards to friends and relatives.

"They're beautiful. I would love to use them, but we're having second thoughts about bothering to send Christmas cards.

"If you don't know they're going to be delivered, what's the point of sending them?"

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