In a major change to the universal service obligation, Royal Mail is reported to be considering dropping Saturday letter delivery and signed-for parcel services.

A review of its services is being undertaken by the company that didn’t benefit from the surge in parcel volumes during the pandemic – it only saw business surge due to government contracts according to recent reports.

At the same time, letter volumes have fallen by almost 20% from pre-pandemic levels and the parcels market has become extremely competitive with the likes of Amazon Logistics taking business from the postal operator.

In the move, that would have to be approved by Parliament, Saturday letter deliveries would be scrapped. This would save Royal Mail as much as £225 million annually, even while it keeps delivering parcels over the weekend. 


Regulator Ofcom has lately shown that the axing of Saturday deliveries would not materially impact the customer. It is not known when the results of the internal review will be published.