Hidden cost as Royal Mail fails

■ SO Ofcom is considering allowing Royal Mail to cut the postal deliveries per week from six to five or even three to help save up to £650million a year.

Letter deliveries in my area are often only three days a week now. I can’t remember the last time we had a six-day postal service.

This has all been since Covid. I’ve queried it several times with our local sorting office and been told there are no issues with post in the local area but it’s down to staff sickness, shortages and/or backlog caused by the strikes.

While more people are emailing, texting and using alternative delivery services it should not be forgotten that there are still millions of us who rely on the postal service as we’ve always known it.

The elderly, the vulnerable and the disabled all suffer when services are cut in favour of the younger online generation.

Jacquelyn Allsop, Lowestoft, Suffolk

■ In view of the prospect of Royal Mail making fewer deliveries, it’s worth remembering those energy and utility company customers who continue to receive paper bills through the mail service. This service has been in steady decline and in some cases it has meant the bill barely arrives before the payment due date.

I have personal experience of this, with BT bills arriving on, or only just before, they’re due to be paid.

I’ve raised this with them and they’re fully aware of the problem but their response

has been to try to talk me into paying online or by direct debit to avoid a late payment charge. John Costello Wolverhampton, West Mids

■ Yet again it will be the people of this country who suffer because of the incompetence of senior management. If this hare-brained proposal to reduce deliveries gets the go ahead it’ll mean thousands of loyal, hard-working employees being made redundant while we have to endure a third-rate service.

They want us to foot the bill for their failures so they can continue to pay shareholders big dividends. We should not let this happen.

J Fellows, Blyth, Northumberland

■ I am really annoyed to read Ofcom is recommending that Royal Mail deliveries are reduced.

As the price of stamps has rocketed in recent years, I have been sending birthday cards one week before the birthday of family and friends and using second class stamps. The Mirror is right – we are paying more for a worse service. D Richens, South East London

■ Ofcom is the latest so-called regulator to fall short of its obligations to the public.

Following Ofwat’s disastrous handling of water companies and Ofgem’s poor control of energy prices, isn’t it time these quangos were disbanded and these public services renationalised?

R Tandy, Liverpool

■ After the general election, the next government should take a good look at renationalising the trains, buses, water, Post Office and Royal Mail.

The public has suffered the loss of these vital services under successive Conservative governments that look after their own interests and not the people’s.

Bob Hughes, Sutton Bridge, Lincs

■ If Royal Mail really wants to cut its delivery service in half, from six days down to three, then the price of a postage stamp should be reduced accordingly, from £1.25p to 63p.

Why should we pay more for a reduced service?