Royal Mail asks to hike prices
Royal Mail has asked the postal regulator for permission to hike prices on business mail products for one year only, in order to generate extra revenue of up to £100m. Royal Mail chief executive Moya Greene said the firm was asking for the chance “to charge a fair price to other companies who use our network to carry mail and to end what is, in effect, the very substantial built-in subsidy which our rivals have enjoyed for years”. The firm made a £157m operating loss last year on “access mail”, collected by rivals but delivered by Royal Mail, amounting to an average loss of 2.5p per item.