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Great to see ofcom ruling in favour of Rm.
Whistl, a would-be competitor to the Royal Mail in the delivery of letters, has had a knockback from the regulator in its latest attempt to take on the privatised national postal giant.
Ofcom, which regulates Royal Mail, has ruled that charges Royal Mail sought to levy on Whistl to use its network were fair. The ruling in a nine-month dispute resolution case is the latest chapter in a decade-long bitter conflict.
Whistl is pursuing £600 million of damages amid accusations that Royal Mail blocked its attempts to become an end-to-end rival deliverer of post. In a case separate to Whistl’s damages claims, Ofcom has ruled on a complaint by Whistl on the fees that it was presented with by Royal Mail for seeking to get post from its financial services and utilities customers into Royal Mail’s delivery network for final-mile delivery.
Under the terms of Royal Mail’s privatisation settlement, postal operators such as Whistl can collect and sort large volumes of mail, typically bank statements and utility bills, before handing it over to Royal Mail to complete the delivery. Royal Mail is bound by the rules to allow this but is allowed to levy an access charge on rival operators.
Whistl had complained to the regulator that despite commercial negotiations, it believed Royal Mail’s charges weren’t appropriate.
Ofcom has now ruled that Royal Mail’s charges were “fair and reasonable”.
Whistl is separately continuing with its legal challenge against Royal Mail for damages in a case in which it, then trading as TNT Europe, secured a record £50 million fine against Royal Mail adjudicated by Ofcom in 2018.
Whistl has long argued that Royal Mail abused its market dominance in effectively shutting down its attempts to become a viable competitor in metropolitan markets. Buoyed by that Ofcom ruling in 2018, Whistl is chasing Royal Mail for £600 million of damages for market abuse.
Whistl, based in Marlow, Buckinghamshire, owns businesses including Parcelhub, which works with e-commerce companies, and Leafletdrop, a marketing service for SMEs.
Full transcript
Royal Mail is facing a £600 million legal claim that it abused its monopoly position to force a competitor out of the market.
The former FTSE 100 postal giant is bracing for a High Court showdown with rival Whistl, which was forced to scale back operations nearly a decade ago with loss of 2,000 jobs.
The civil proceedings follow the conclusion of a protracted legal wrangle that led to Royal Mail paying a record regulatory fine of £50 million for illegally abusing its monopoly position.
The spectre of a major financial claim will heap pressure on new chief executive Martin Seidenberg as he sets out his plans to turn around the company after the conclusion of a bitter industrial dispute with union leaders.
Seidenberg will provide the first glimpse of his vision for the Royal Mail parent International Distribution Services (IDS) at the company’s interim results on Thursday.
The Supreme Court last year upheld a ruling by the postal regulator Ofcom that Royal Mail had engaged in anti-competitive practices in 2014 by squeezing out Whistl, then called TNT UK.
Whistl planned to deliver business mail — which also included items such as debit and credit cards on behalf of banks — to millions of households after trials in a handful of cities had proved successful.
The company intended to introduce the deliveries to 42 per cent of UK homes using its own posties and pay Royal Mail to deliver to the rest of the country.
Shortly before Whistl expanded its operations, Royal Mail increased the prices it charged third parties to deliver on their behalf. The move rendered Whistl’s plans uneconomic and led to it suspending rollout of “final-mile delivery” in 2015.
Whistl complained to Ofcom, claiming it had been a victim of anti-competitive practices.
Ofcom agreed and slapped Royal Mail with a £50 million fine. A years-long appeals process followed until the Supreme Court sided with Ofcom in July last year.
Lawyers for Whistl are now pushing for a preliminary hearing in the High Court next year. Sources close to Royal Mail said any proceedings were unlikely to begin until 2025.
Royal Mail and IDS made references to the Whistl proceedings in its annual report without referencing the £600 million quantum of the claim. The report said: “Royal Mail believes Whistl’s claim is without merit and will defend it robustly.” A spokeswoman for the company declined to comment further.
Whistl’s claim is being bankrolled by Vannin Capital, the London litigation funder that was sold to US private equity firm Fortress in 2019.
Nick Wells, executive chairman of Whistl, insisted that he was “very confident as to the merits of our claim” and said interest on the £600 million of damages was accruing at a rate of £50 million a year.
Amsterdam-listed PostNL retains a 17.5 per cent stake in Whistl. PostNL’s largest shareholder is Vesa Equity, the investment vehicle of Czech billionaire Daniel Kr
Hi Oligarch,
I wanted to buy before the second vote, from my own experience at our depot it was a yes but was unsure about the rm side and have been dithering since.
Anyway, 2.37 seems to be a good entry point is it the bottom who knows? See what happens next Thursday, in anycase it's a long term hold so not bothered about daily/weekly/monthly fluctuations. FWIW it seems like a no brainer if your prepared to hold long term.Good luck.
I can't see rm going into administration in the short term, unless the bond holders call in there debt early, which I think they could propose if rm reports full year losses for 2022.
He will have to pay the highest price over the last 12 months.
Drilling on a North Sea oil and gas project is set to start shortly after a partnership deal was completed.
Europa Oil & Gas is taking a 25 per cent share of the Serenity prospect from i3 Energy. In return, Europa is paying for 46.25 per cent of the cost of the appraisal well, assuming that the cost does not top £15 million. Anything beyond that would be shared, based on the respective stakes held by the companies.
The drilling on Serenity is scheduled to begin next month and should give a greater understanding of the resources available in the area. Oil was discovered there in 2019 and it was estimated that up to 197 million barrels could be in place. It is thought that about 100 million of that total could could be recovered and there is the possibility of using nearby infrastructure.
The site lies close to i3’s Liberator discovery and is not far from producing fields such as Blake and Tain in the Outer Moray Firth off the coast of Aberdeen. The company, which has its headquarters in Aberdeenshire, was floated on Aim, the junior stock market in London, in 2017. It has producing assets in Canada, as well as licences in UK waters.
The London-based Europa is also listed on Aim and has interests in the North Sea, Ireland and Morocco. It raised more than £7 million through a share placing in March to fund its portion of the Serenity well.
The partnership deal was signed in April and now has been completed after approval from the North Sea Transition Authority.
Majid Shafiq, 58, the i3 chief executive, said: “We are delighted to have successfully completed the agreement for Serenity and to welcome Europa as our joint venture partner. The next significant step is to drill the appraisal well, which is on track for spud in September. The well will help us to delineate the size of the field and will provide the critical information required to formulate an effective development plan for a potentially very large oilfield.”
Simon Oddie, 69, the Europa chief executive, said: “The Serenity appraisal well, an important near-term catalyst for Europa, has the potential to prove sufficient recoverable volumes to justify a standalone development and could deliver significant near-term value to our shareholders.”
Shares in Europa Oil & Gas rose ¼p, or 8.5 per cent, to a shade over 2½p, while i3 Energy was largely flat above 29¼p
No who would?
But here's there website, happy reading.
https://www.pala.com
Seems Beijing could be the issue, just hold!
https://news.sky.com/story/covid-19-fears-of-lockdown-in-beijing-prompt-panic-buying-as-mass-testing-introduced-12598548
Another classic line fron none other than Mr costs.
Lol.....
: MOVING SP.07 Feb 2022 15:21
Even if P3 is a flop I have no doubt RM will move back to COPD, I will be happy to assist with the futher fund raise and wait another 2-3 years to see this flourish. RM has been doing this 15 years he knows exactly what he is doing.