Royal Mail, the UK’s oldest postal service, has received plenty of bad news in recent weeks. It has been fined for failing to achieve its delivery targets, lost an exclusive deal with the Post Office and recorded operating losses of £319 million – £100 million higher than for the same period last year.
There are understandable explanations for these problems, not least the long-running dispute over workers’ pay and conditions, and the continuing decline in the volume of letters people send.
