Member Info for OliGarch

Arsenal, my mail centre does not have any parcels automation but there are quite a few OPGs who are in their late 50s and early 60s who would welcome it.
Our manual parcel operation is totally inefficient despite the shift managers trying out various methods. The main problem is that our building simply isn't big enough for current demand and the OPGs and casuals are unable to keep up with the amount of work on hand.

Shaunymac, the business certainly needs to automate parcels if it is to stand any chance of posting future profits and being sustainable in the future. Rico started his five year plan and got as far as building one parcel hub out of the three that were proposed. Out of the 39 mail centres, only the 12 largest have parcel sorting machines but this needs to increase however the cuts to staffing in mail centres would be dramatic with potentially 50% of postal grades needing to either retire or be redeployed elsewhere in the business. The main issue for the CWU is how the excess staff are redeployed but I can see the delivery workforce needing to increase by around 10% so there may be opportunities there.
The bottom line is that the business needs to move to parcels automation faster and at the moment they are not doing that do the share price will reflect this.

Shaunymac, it's all down to simple logistics really. In a mail centre, the vast majority of letters are automated at a rate of over 40,000 letters per hour by three operators and a good portion of the mail is DSA which comes in treated ready for processing therefore the staff cost per 1000 items is quite low.
Parcels are different. They are bulky, quite often irregularly shaped and only about 20% are processed by parcel sorting machines so the rest are sorted manually at a rate of less than 1000 per hour. It's quite easy to bulk out a small office with parcels and it gives the impression that there's a lot of revenue but it's a drop in the ocean compared to letters. The revenue generated by one small parcel under 2kg is probably around £3 but for the same space you could possibly have in excess of £20 of second class letters.
The delivery vans can only physically carry so much so it's easy to bulk them out with low revenue generating parcels that have the same delivery costs as letters.
Apologies if that was a little long winded.

Mike "I'm surprised a property developer doesn't buy us out just to get their hands on the property assets and liquidate the rest of the business!"
I'm fairly confident that's never going to happen....ever...lol.

Tony, I sometimes wonder what the big money players are up to. Rico was buying shares from November 2018at £3.18 all the way to the 4th of June 2019 at £1.98. He even bought 300,000 shares on the 18th of December 2019 at £2.34 and he was the CEO who was supposed to be "in the know". By my calculations, he currently stands at 1,212,000 shares at an average of £2.43. Either these guys are playing a very long game or they're not as savvy as we thought?
As for Kretinsky's holding....who knows. Perhaps he's hiding his money from the Russians...lol

GZK, "The agreement in place between Greene & The CWU". I assume that you are referring to the shorter working week? This was not an agreement between Moya Greene and the CWU, it was an agreement between Royal Mail and the CWU. It wasn't "unsustainable" however it fell over mainly because delivery office managers failed to implement hours reductions or log their savings correctly. Also Rico sacked all of the senior management team that had anything to do with the agreement so that there was no "steering group" thus deliberately sabotaging any chances of success.
Royal Mail are not a "parcel company"....yet.
It's true that with the implementation of parcel automation there will be job reductions in mail centres but this could be countered by an increase in the number of delivery staff required as RM move into the parcels market.

Jiddy, thisismoney also reported;
"Royal Mail has warned that its UK business is likely to be lossmaking this year and yesterday it warned that a rise in parcel deliveries during the pandemic had not been enough to cancel out lost revenue from a simultaneous drop in letter volumes.
Credit Suisse analyst Arthur Truslove said Royal Mail's turnaround plans were now "likely back to square one".
A brave move indeed.

Jiddy, I hope that you are in this for the long haul. You are certainly braver than me.

Pieface, I thought that he was already the head of Royal Mail Operations UK?

.....or half depending on what happens next.....

Scamp, that's a good summary although I was under the impression that any shares purchased would be subject to tax if sold within five years of purchase? I'm not sure what happens if you retire before the five year period?

200iq, I think that you may have a point regarding the dividend. The "Czech Sphinx" has purchased £100m worth of shares in the knowledge that there is currently no dividend so is he possibly planning something else? Who knows?
The incoming CEO will have to hit the ground running here with last year's issue of the SWW and average holiday pay on the back burner whilst still needing to resolve this year's pay deal and the current pandemic and having to steer the business in the right direction.
It's going to be an interesting 2020 that's for sure.

The next four or five weeks are going to be extremely interesting for RM, the investors and the workforce.
Speculation on Rico's replacement will be rife as will be any further investment by the "Czech Sphinx".
Will the incoming CEO do what Rico did and sack the majority of his predecessors appointments in order to bring in his own team?
Will the new CEO be open to negotiation with the CWU?
Will there be changes to Rico's five year plan or will it be replaced with a new plan?
This share is most certainly going to get interesting.

The article mentions this;
"Royal Mail has been plunged into crisis after it ousted chief executive Rico Back on Friday without a permanent replacement".
Surely it should have read "before it ousted...."?

Wolves, apology accepted and no hard feelings.

Wolves, I am pleased to learn that you have not yet had to deal with the probate service in you lifetime. Unfortunately they do not accept an uploaded will, it has to be the original one hence the need to use the mail. I am waiting for the grant of probate which is also sent via the mail and cannot be emailed. Also, many banks and institutions require an original copy of a death certificate which has to be sent and returned via the mail.
So, yes... I am waiting for a letter and not splitting hairs.
I extend best wishes to your parents and in-laws, who are obviously still alive.

Actually Wolves, I am currently waiting for letters from the probate team in Chelmsford, NS&I and HMRC.
It's probably just me though...

RE: wolvesposty18 Mar 2020 17:20
ispy in these times I said who needs a letter???? come on mate behave

Shaunymac, I believe that there was a temporary agreement for RM to cease the delivery of letters on Saturday in order to try and clear the backlog of parcels.
For the last three weeks, my mail centre has not processed or sequenced letters on a Friday night so together with the Saturday collection it has all been rolled over to the Sunday staff to clear.
I suspect that this agreement will soon end now that Rico is no in longer the CEO.

Scamp, are you suggesting that this group of very powerful shareholders will be influencial in appointing the next CEO and BoD?