Royal Mail states that it was “well-developed contingency plans” but cautions that they cannot completely replace frontline workers, adding that customers should expect significant disruption. With the exception of Special Delivery, Royal Mail will not be delivering letters on strike days.

With the CWU warning that deliveries and collections will be shut down in large parts of the UK, Royal Mail has admitted that the four days of strike action will cause the company to make a loss in the current financial year.

The CWU has stated that Royal Mail’s offer of a 5.5% pay increase only amounts to a 2% increase due to inflation. Royal Mail believes that significant operational change is required to make the business sustainable in the long term

In a statement provided to the PPA, Royal Mail said: “After more than three months of talks, the CWU have failed to engage in any meaningful discussion on the changes we need to modernise, or to come up with alternative ideas. The CWU rejected our offer worth up to 5.5% for CWU grade colleagues, the biggest increase we have offered for many years. In a business that is currently losing £1 million pounds a day, we can only fund this offer by agreeing the changes that will pay for it.

“We are ready to talk further with CWU to try and avert damaging industrial action but, as we have consistently said, it must be about both change and pay. We have contingency plans in place and will be working hard to minimise disruption and get our services back to normal as soon as we can to keep people, businesses and the country connected.”

The PPA will meet with Royal Mail this week to discuss how the impact of industrial action on our members can be mitigated and minimised, and better understand Royal Mail’s preparation for the strike. We will impress upon Royal Mail the serious impact that the strike action will have on members’ subscriptions businesses, and the urgent need for the dispute with the CWU to be remedied as swiftly as possible.