Nic-Hit Pro

Potential Delays During Royal Mail Strikes and How We are Helping - Aug 2022

Royal Mail workers are due to go on strike on several dates during the three weeks from August 26th - September 9th, and this may have a significant impact on their usual delivery times.
 
To help avoid/reduce the impact of delivery delays we are putting in place some measures to help you:
 

  1. If you would like to use our free Royal Mail delivery (on UK orders over £25), we recommend ordering 5-7 days earlier (just to be extra safe - the delays may only add 1 or 2 days, but we can't be sure). If you don't have this luxury, we have other options below.
 
  1. If you would like to use DHL’s guaranteed next-day GB delivery service, we will be temporarily subsidising more of the cost of DHL and reducing the price for you starting the day before the Royal Mail strike action begins – from Thursday 25th August for approximately 3 weeks.
    • From Thursday 25th August we will be offering UK DHL delivery for £2.75 on all orders over £50.
    • We will be subsidising the cost DHL charge us even more substantially than normal to offer you this price. This isn’t sustainable long-term, but we want to help you over this period.
    • DHL is not available to Northern Ireland, the Highlands or Islands.
 
  1. If you are ordering internationally, choose DHL/Express Courier – or bear in mind Royal Mail deliveries will potentially take roughly 5-7 days longer than usual, and order in advance accordingly.
 
  1. Choose Evri (formerly Hermes) if you want Royal Mail pricing and trust Evri (Hermes) to deliver reliably to you or a local delivery location (e.g. local newsagent)
    • Although we have heard feedback that they might not be the most popular carrier, and we cannot guarantee that they will be up to the same standard as Royal Mail, because Evri (Hermes) are not subject to the upcoming strike action they might be an alternative for you to consider during this period.
    • We can’t really recommend this option as we haven’t worked with this delivery company, and we cannot vouch for their reliability and their customer support is extremely limited. We won’t be able follow up with them to help you track a parcel, etc. Their service is also totally uninsured.
    • But some customers tell us that in some areas of the UK the service is good.
    • Evri claim delivery in 1-2 working days. We CANNOT guarantee this!
    • We understand delivery is more likely to be reliable if upon receiving notification from Evri that they have your parcel, you click the link to change delivery to your local Evri delivery shop/newsagent.
    • This delivery service may be okay if you are confident in Evri (Hermes) and have sufficient trust in them to deliver accurately to your house (or are willing and able to have them deliver to your local Hermes delivery shop/newsagent where you can pick it up).
    • If you trust them and are confident in their local service, you can get free delivery this way (on orders over £25, else just £1.99), on a service that isn’t striking.
    • Evri orders can only be sent same-day if ordered before 2pm and this service will only be available from Thur 25th August (when RM strike impact takes hold) until Wed 14th September.

 
We roughly estimate the impact of the strikes to be as follows:

Potential Royal Mail Delivery Dates based on Date Orders Placed

The below dates are EXTREMELY estimated. No-one really knows the precise impact the strike action will have on Royal Mail timings, including very senior managers at Royal Mail. But using the best information available, this is our best estimate of when orders sent with Royal Mail may be delivered.
 
We have been cautious in our assessment, so delivery could be quicker, but given the uncertain nature of the delays Royal Mail will experience, it is always possible delivery could be slower than this:

  • Order Fri 19th August: delivery Sat 20th August, Mon 22nd or Tue 23rd (depending on extra volumes in our & RM systems)
  • Order Sat 20th – Mon 22nd August: delivery Tue 23rd, Wed 24th or Thur 25th
  • Order Tue 23rd August: delivery Wed 24th, Thur 25th and if not by then, next date is Sat 27th but depending on impact of strike could be longer
  • Order Wed 24th August: delivery Thur 24th, Sat 27th or Tue 30th
  • Order Thur 25th August: delivery Sat 27th, Tue 30th August, Thur 1st September, Fri 2nd Sep
  • Order Fri 26th August: delivery Tue 30th August, Thur 1st Sep, Fri 2nd, Sat 3rd
  • Order Sat 27th – Tue 30th August: delivery Thur 1st Sep (unlikely), Fri 2nd, Sat 3rd, Mon 5th
  • Order Wed 31st August – Thur 1st Sep: delivery Fri 2nd, Sat 3rd, Mon 5th, Tue 6th
  • Order Fri 2nd Sep: delivery Sat 3rd, Mon 5th, Tue 6th, Wed 7th
  • Order Thur 8th – Fri 9th Sep: delivery Mon 12th, Tue 13th, Wed 14th, Thur 15th
  • Order Sat 10th – Mon 12th Sep: delivery Tue 13th, Wed 14th, Thur 15th, Fri 16th
  • Order Tue 13th Sep – Thur 15th Sep: Royal Mail strikes are over, but we expect delivery times of 2-3 days while RM work through the back-log
  • Order Fri 16th Sep onwards: we hope by this point RM will have cleared the back-log and delivery should generally be next-day (if ordered Mon-Fri)
 
The actual strike days
Knowing these dates isn’t terribly useful as it ignores:
  • the cumulative impact of parcels sent the day before strike days not being delivered on strike days,
  • parcels sent on strike days not being processed until the next working-day,
  • bank holidays that workers are strategically striking around,
  • Sundays where Royal Mail won’t have much opportunity to catch-up,
  • and the significant volume build-up in Royal Mail distribution centres that will take time for Royal Mail to work through, with not many days over this 3 week period to catch-up
 
Nonetheless the strike days are:
  • Friday 26th August
  • (a ‘convenient’ bank holiday on 29th August that acts like a strike day)
  • Wednesday 31st August
  • Thursday 8th September
  • Friday 9th September
 
In conclusion:
  • Order 5-7 days earlier if you would like to use our usual Royal Mail delivery service
  • Get guaranteed next-day UK delivery with DHL, discounted to just £2.75 for orders over £50 service from Thursday 25th August for approximately 3 weeks. Not available to Northern Ireland, Highlands or Islands.
  • If you are ordering internationally, choose DHL/Express Courier
  • Choose Evri (formerly Hermes) if you want Royal Mail pricing and trust Evri (Hermes) to deliver reliably to you or a local delivery location (e.g. local newsagent) – but we cannot vouch for their reliability as we have not worked with them before