Royal Mail fined £5.6m by Ofcom for missing delivery targets

Ofcom has fined Royal Mail £5.6m for missing postal delivery targets in the last financial year "by a significant and unexplained margin".

The regulator said Royal Mail’s reported performance results showed that it had only delivered 73.7% of first class mail on time and 90.7% of second class mail on time, and completed 89.35% of delivery routes for each day on which a delivery was required.

Even after adjusting Royal Mail’s performance for the impact of strikes, extreme weather and the Stansted runway closure, its first and second class performance was still only 82% and 95.5% respectively.

"This means that Royal Mail breached its obligations by failing to meet its targets by a significant and unexplained margin," Ofcom said. "This caused considerable harm to customers, and Royal Mail took insufficient steps to try and prevent this failure."

Under Ofcom’s rules, each year Royal Mail is required to deliver 93% of first class mail within one working day and 98.5% of second class mail within three working days, and complete 99.9% of delivery routes for each day on which a delivery is required.

Ofcom said the fine was reduced by 30% to reflect Royal Mail’s admissions of liability and its agreement to settle the case.

Royal Mail is owned by International Distribution Services.