Anyone here have a Royal Mail Business account?

[jonathanjohnson100]

I'm fuming.
I've had a business account at Royal mail for 15 years. I spend a lot of money per year with royal mail. My business is not a giant retailer or anything, just a small ecommerce business.

I found out that paying for postage for parcels is much much much cheaper on a personal account. 70% of my postage is parcels.

I spent 45 minutes speaking to some imbeciles on the help line.

I'm absolutely fuming. Royal mail are a complete joke.

Am I the only one to experience?

 

[littlebonzo]

I'm pretty much in the same boat (same as you, 15 years) so following with interest. Any conversation with Royal Mail results in a different answer from the last person. It is so infuriating. Don't even get me started on Basic Barcodes!

 

[hikiwari]

@jonathanjohnson100 I deal with RM quite a lot and yes, it can be difficult.
Can you tell me the size of package you are sending and the price you are paying because personal should absolutely not be cheaper than business. Also, what RM service do you use? Are your parcels collected or franked and dropped at the post office?

 

[paulears]

Yes - same with the Parcelforce Account I just started. I got all the documents sent in the post from Royal Mail - I thought they were two separate organisations, but not. I have tried just one of the parcels I regularly send and on-line pay as you go is cheaper for every one. PLUS - the account version will not let me send some at all for size restrictions, yet on-line, it's fine! They also charge extra for going North, and more again if going over water is involved - IoM and NI are stupidly expensive. On my ebay Royal Mail sales something has happened too - I've been paying £4.85 a parcel for a long time, has dropped to £4.35 - so ebay 1st class signed is now cheaper than I can get doing it myself. Bizarre!

 

[DefinitelyMaybeUK]

I found out that paying for postage for parcels is much much much cheaper on a personal account.

What service is this? Sounds a bit odd, as RM publish "rate cards" for both and the business ones always seem marginally cheaper - it's services like Tracked 24/48 which are bespoke price to businesses that could appear more, but you need to take into account the freedom of having no size & weight steps on these services and the tracking benefits, notifications etc.

 

[Ryan Paul]

I recommend you go to the local sorting office and talk to someone.
They're always quick at getting on to us to settle a bill.

 

[AlanJ1]

I recommend you go to the local sorting office and talk to someone.
They're always quick at getting on to us to settle a bill.

They can't do anything. Sorting offices aren't there to talk about pricing.

We need more information from the opening poster. I presume as above it is low weighted tracked 24/48 items.

 

[jonathanjohnson100]

And here I was thinking I was being solely victimised by Royal Mail.
Seems I am not the only one. ?

@littlebonzo Tell me more about the Basic Barcodes. Not aware of that.

@hikiwari I have a an OBA, Online Business Account. The service is called PPI I think? I might be getting my terminology wrong. Size of items is small packet. Being charged £3.68 per item. On the phone, they 'claimed' it should be £3.35. I was able to confirm this was NOT what I was being charged. Last Thursday, I sent 5 small parcels (nothing else) - I was able to divide by 5 on the amount charged and get £3.68 per item.

My first query to them was how do I work out how much I am being charged per item. The system makes it IMPOSSIBLE to find out. They were erming and aaarign and passing to senior management for expert consultation but they had no answer. The ONLY way to find prices is to go through pages of monthly invoices - so that will be 4+ weeks after you have sent items.

I blindly accepted I was getting the best possible price.

+ You are wrong about pricing. Logic says having a business account and doing the sorting for Royal Mail that you are charged less. No. This is not true. ?

@DefinitelyMaybeUK This is what businesses get charged: https://www.royalmail.com/sites/roy...mail-business-price-guide-january-2022-v1.pdf - this gives all rates. Unless you send a HUGE amount of mail, you will pay this price. This is my knowledge and understanding. 'Bespoke' pricing when you have a monopoly of so much... I don't think Royal Mail will give many real discounts (happy to hear I am wrong).

@Ryan Paul Sorting office? OK, I may try that. It sounds odd and bizarre to need to have to do this. In today's day and age, not being able to simply look it up on your online account?? Seems crazy.

@AlanJ1 It's just First Class and Second Class postage. I've done my research. I know I'm getting screwed by Royal Mail. The price of a First Class Small Packet is £3.85 - if you pay at the Post Office. £3.68 if you have a business account. £3.35 if you have a personal Royal Mail account. Just sheer madness.

If someone can point out that I have gone bonkers and have got my facts and figures wrong, I would welcome to hear it and give them a big hug to celebrate my mistakes.

 

[hikiwari]

Why are you starting another thread with more information rather than giving us the full details here?

Royal Mail's mad postal system - what happens if you send a bag of sand?

Letter. Large Letter. Small Packet. Large Packet. = grubby greedy Royal Mail filling their pockets with profit. I know it's been around for many years now and we have accepted this mad system. It's a flawed system. It's a dumb system. Imagine an envelope with a bag of sand. Lie it down and...

www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk

 

[jonathanjohnson100]

@hikiwari Sorry if I hurt your feelings. I personally felt that it deserved it's own discussion and was a different topic to the one which I started this thread. My first post was about charges (where personal online customers got a MUCH better deal than business customers) and not about the Royal Mail system and how it works. Apologies in advance. My bad.

 

[hikiwari]

You didn't hurt my feelings. It's just a bit rude as a number of us were trying to help you.
We have a large RM account spending towards £120,000pa and we are looked after by a Territorial Account Manager. I could have helped you by asking him a couple of specific questions in our fortnightly calls.

 

[DefinitelyMaybeUK]

Unless you send a HUGE amount of mail, you will pay this price. This is my knowledge and understanding. 'Bespoke' pricing when you have a monopoly of so much... I don't think Royal Mail will give many real discounts (happy to hear I am wrong).

I didn't say they give discount I specifically referred to the Tracked 24 and Tracked 48 services, which are (or at least appear to be) bespoke priced per customer depending on expected quantity and nominal weight. No prices are listed, and if you sign up, the agreement is you don't divulge your rate You don't have to send 1000's, but they quote a 1000+/year when I last looked. But note this "1000" is across domestic and international tracked services, so it may (not) suit you. What I was trying to get across is that depending on what you're sending (size/weight), one-price services like these maybe worth looking at - you don't of course, have you charge your customer that one price though

I think you need to swot up on what service code you're sending (it's not PPI - that a generic RM term for account mail!). I guess it's BPL as per the PDF. If so, then a 1kg small parcel is indeed £3.68 1st class. I must admit (and I guess this is where your goat has been well and truly got..) is that the RM website online price for 1st class small parcel is £3.35 So yep, you're correct, Joe Bloggs gets better price. What you, as a business service user gets though, is apparent Saturday delivery (which isn't necessarily so for personal customers), plus a higher claim limit I suspect. None of these could be deal clinchers for you I suspect...

 

[MikeCC]

Sounds like you should have been advised about RM24/48 services (page 16 in price book). RM24 is £3.11 ex-VAT (£3.73 inc VAT) but you need to speak to account management to get it on your contract. 1st class small parcel is £3.68 but VAT exempt.

Whether it makes a difference depends if you are VAT-registered or not. Hadn't appreciated the online price of £3.35 though - seems a bit out of line.

Barcodes aren't a problem if you use Click and Drop on account and print the thermal labels. If you can work in a system to import addresses and pack weights for orders, even easier.

 

[jonathanjohnson100]

@hikiwari Apologies for my comments. It was keyboard warrior syndrome (saying things without thought) and typing really fast. I really appreciate you taking time to reply to my messages.

@DefinitelyMaybeUK I checked online. The code for parcels is BPL1 and BPL2 (1st and 2nd class). Sizes of parcels are all small parcels size.

@MikeCC I've looked at RM24/48 before - always been too expensive.

I guess it's just one of those things. I've now started to use my personal account for parcels. It's madness and crazy. At least I know that I am not going mad. ?‍‍

EDIT: One mad thing is when I called up and asked about the prices, I was made to feel that I as an alien asking a completely utter dumb and stoopid question that no one else had ever asked about. I'm sure they were fully aware of my gripe - but multiple manager seemed to have no clue what everything was about.