South Ayrshire School mail bill is a first class disgrace

Oct 3 2008

SCHOOLS could be forced to fork out up to £15,000 a year to have mail delivered.

They’ll have to stump up for the cost of redelivering mail following public holidays after Royal Mail chiefs imposed the charge.

SNP councillor Nan McFarlane revealed that schools will be forced to use money earmarked for books and other equipment to cover the cost.

And she insists that the charge is unfair.

The councillor for Troon said: “Schools don’t have letter boxes because they would be obvious targets for vandals if they did.

“When they are closed for local public holidays the Royal Mail until now have delivered the mail the following day without charge.

“But I’ve been told that one of our primary schools was charged £28 to have their mail delivered following the holiday last Monday.

“I’ve since made enquiries and discovered that they’ve all been told that they will be charged for this service in future. When you buy a stamp and post a letter you expect it to be delivered without further charge to the recipient. This is a disgrace.”

Councillor McFarlane added: “My rough calculation of the cost to schools will be around £15,000 a year. this is money that should be used for books in schools.

“It you take this to its natural conclusion I wonder if they are going to demand payment in the same circumstances from all council buildings that close on public holidays.

“If so this would cost a fortune. Our mail is delivered by truck to County Buildings Can you imagine how much extra they’d charge us for that?”

South Ayrshire Council’s education department insist that they now have no choice but to order Royal Mail not to make the deliveries in future.

A spokesman said: “The department considers these are charges they cannot meet and we will be discouraging parents and others from writing to schools in the lead-up to holidays”.

“We will also be advising the Royal Mail that we do not wish to use the mail redirect service.”

However, mail chiefs say that competition laws demand that they make the charge.

A spokesman explained: “There is a charge to all business users for the Keepsafe of mail and due to competition laws, Royal Mail cannot differentiate between customers. This is a national policy which was introduced in September 2007.

“All schools received notification of this change and reminders of the Business Keepsafe service are sent out periodically before any holiday period.

“If we are unable to deliver the mail and there is no Keepsafe in place, Royal Mail will return the mail to sender after three weeks (one week for recorded delivery) if the mail has not been collected or redelivered.”