Mail deliveries delayed as staff have to isolate

SHEPSHED IS ONE OF 90 OFFICES HIT BY ISOLATION SHORTAGES

A COUNTY delivery office was one of 90 Royal Mail centres hit by staff shortages due to Covid last week.

The postal service has warned customers of continued delays because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, with deliveries across the country affected by problems caused by staff shortages due to Covid and self-isolation rules.

In Leicestershire, the problem was acute last week at the Shepshed delivery office.

Delays had been reported in the city and county over the busy Christmas and new year period due to high levels of absenteeism at the Royal Mail’s South Midlands Mail Centre in Northampton, but more than a fortnight after Christmas, there are still customers who are not receiving their post and parcels on time.

The Royal Mail network uses air, rail and road to move letters and parcels between distribution hubs, mail processing centres and delivery offices across the UK. The network was reported to have operated to schedule over the weekend - except for a number of

“small local offices”, including

Shepshed.

In a statement, the Royal Mail said: “We aim to deliver to all addresses we have mail for, six days a week.

“In a small number of local offices, this may temporarily not be possible due to local issues such as Covid-related self isolation, high levels of sick absence, resourcing, or other local factors.

“In those cases, we will rotate deliveries to minimise the delay to individual customers.”

It adds: “We also provide targeted support to those offices to address their challenges and restore our service to the high standard our customers would normally receive. We’re sorry for any inconvenience.”

The Royal Mail said the added pressure of sorting, organising and delivering Covid-19 test kits has exacerbated problems in some areas.

“Every day we serve hundreds of thousands of test kits on behalf of the NHS,” said a spokesperson.

“We’re in regular contact with the UK Health Security Agency regarding the increased demand for test kits and have extended our capacity to help manage this at their request.”

They added: “We continue to prioritise NHS test kits for delivery and collection, including additional collections at our priority postboxes.”