Postal rates

 

Postal rates

 A standard first-class stamp in UK costs £1.80, up 10p from April 7^th, 2026.

 A second-class stamp is £0.91, just over half the price of a first-class stamp. It increased by 4p in April.

Those who still send letters usually opt for second-class postage. It’s noticeably cheaper, and the letters often arrive at the same time as correspondence with first-class stamps. Remoter areas will often experience significant delays, even with first-class postage.

At present the Post Office site states that second-class letters will arrive within three business days, and a first-class letter will be delivered by the next working day, including Saturdays.

Today, a flyer dropped through our letter box, in bright red Royal Mail livery. It stated, '2^nd class mail is changing.’ The changes are intended ‘to deliver a better all-round service.’ Considering how customers send mail, Royal Mail aims ‘to offer a more reliable and sustainable service.’

Letters and cards carrying second-class stamps will be delivered every other day, and if one of the days is a Saturday, the letter or card will be delivered within three weekdays. So, something posted before collection on a Friday may not reach the recipient until the following Tuesday.

First-class mail will continue to be delivered six days a week. Mail is never delivered on a Sunday, though parcels can be delivered ‘up to’ seven days a week.

Is this change intended to encourage more people to buy first-class stamps, so that cards can be expected to arrive for the important date they’ve been sent for? I suggest that fewer people will bother to send anything by surface mail.

The peak of 20 billion letters in 2004-2005 has dropped to 6.6 billion and is forecast to drop to 4 billion in the next few years.

The decline is blamed on the growing dependence on digital communication. This has been reflected worldwide. At the same time, parcel deliveries have increased markedly.

Are we witnessing the demise of the personal letter or card? Will future generations be unable to read letters sent by their forebears? Will anyone be able to read another person’s handwriting? 

I know of children already who cannot read cursive script. This is not so surprising, since, unless we have been specially taught, it is difficult for most people to read journals and notes written by people in the 16^th century. Queen Victoria’s handwriting from the nineteenth century was difficult to decipher.

It would be disappointing if future historians and biographers in their research had nothing more exciting to sift through than emails and text messages.

Jigsaws

Jigsaws – you either love them or hate them. I fall into the first category and find it almost impossible to pass a work in progress without accepting the challenge of fitting at least one piece. Some jigsaws are rather thin and cheap, the parts creasing or breaking off. Others are sturdy and cleanly cut. Wooden jigsaws are wonderful – colourful chunky sections designed to be held in hot little hands and to withstand many of the rigours small children can impose on their toys.

The worst jigsaws are the papery cardboard ones to be found in cheap Christmas crackers or as free gifts in packets of cereal or children's magazines. It was just such a one I was wrestling with recently. Actually, it was worse than a freebie because the pieces were so small, each one approximately one and five sixteenths by three sixteenths of an inch (3.4 centimetres x 0.5 centimetres) You may have realised by now that this was no ordinary jigsaw. In fact it was a 'failed delivery' card from Royal Mail indicating where and when a parcel for which Barry had been waiting could be signed for and collected. It had arrived while he was taking me to the railway station on Saturday (when did they start to be known as 'train stations' by the way?)

As it was a Bank Holiday on Monday he had to wait until today to pick it up but when he looked for the card yesterday it was nowhere to be found. Had I seen it? I could have pretended ignorance of the whole matter but would it have been better to spend the entire day on a spurious hunt with him becoming increasingly irate and repeating at frequent intervals, 'I left it there; I know I left it there. It can't have disappeared. Are you sure you haven't seen it?' or to come clean and confess that I had shredded it? Dear reader, I bit the bullet and bowed my head to receive the disbelieving scorn poured on it.

Now, you may wonder why I had destroyed the only evidence Barry had of the existence of a parcel addressed to him. If you had lived with him as long as I have you would nod your head in sympathy – empathy, even – for he is the untidiest individual I have ever known. Important details are scribbled on pieces of paper, backs of envelopes, till receipts, the back of his hand. I used to tidy them away (not his hand, obviously . . .) and we have been making an effort lately to make space in our increasingly cluttered house. We also have a number of deliveries throughout the year and delivery cards are like confetti – the last one certainly was by the time I'd minced it! – so when I saw it by the front door I assumed it referred to another package we had just received. 'Didn't you read it?' he demanded. It was not the time to make a clever rejoinder so I bit my tongue and got on with the task of putting the card back together. This involved searching through the contents of the shredder basket – it's amazing how many papers there are that are the same shade of Royal Mail red – and sticking them on transparent plastic. I had thought it through, you see – the back needed to be legible too. After an hour or two of this exercise I was getting nowhere fast and eventually Barry, having discovered that he had other evidence of his purchase and the subsequent right to the failed delivery, made me a cup of tea and apologised. He's a very nice man really.

Today he collected the parcel without any problems whatsoever. When I asked him if he'd explained what his idiot wife had done he tried to dissemble but the grin gave away the truth, bless him!

Did you know there are people, usually women, who are employed to put together important shredded documents? Maybe it's to do with industrial espionage or political fandangos but these women have small hands with nimble fingers. I haven't but I did quite well.

Flowers and bracelets

My mother-in-law always sends flowers for my birthday and this year was no exception. The flowers, beautifully scented Longiflorum lilies, arrived two days after my birthday looking a little limp. With some hesitation I told her this while I was thanking her for them and she was most indignant for she had ordered them to be delivered on the due date. She is in her nineties but still fully aware of what she has ordered and when, and so she contacted the company to make a gentle but insistent complaint. It transpired that the company was not at fault – they had dispatched the flowers in good time. In fact, because the local Royal Mail depot is being closed down, everything is being sent to Swindon and there is chaos. The flower company 'Bunches' is ill served by this change but today, by way of apology, a further delivery of wonderful Longiflorum lilies arrived, with a complimentary box of chocolates. Delightful – though I did think the floral apology should have been delivered to my mother-in-law. Now I have a vase full of these gorgeous blooms – thank you, Dorothy – thank you, Bunches.

For this birthday my husband had taken enormous pains to design a beautiful bracelet in the process of which he was given tremendous help and advice from 'mememe jewellery and accessories'. The bracelet was destined to arrive by 1:00 p.m. on the day before my birthday and of course it had to be signed for, so the entire day was spent waiting for it to be delivered. Many phone calls were made between Berkshire and Newcastle upon Tyne and eventually a very nice South African, JJ, drove from Swindon to hand it to my relieved husband, just after 5:00 p.m. The next day our local postie told us that JJ is the best boss he's ever had.

There are so many helpful, pleasant people 'out there' doing their very best to provide excellent service. How sad it is that they are let down so often by the apparently unnecessary reorganisation of services.