Progress?

[patman post]

The biggest service the Post Office performed was stolen from them in furtherance of the cashless society, and the small shops provision of those services subsidised UK wide went  under.

What service has been stolen from Post Office PLC? 

The Post Office is currently increasing the range of services it offers, often in better and more convenient ways than some businesses (eg, banks) its counters are replacing.

The Government is subsidising the Post Office with grants and investment averaging well over £100 million a year. It has pledged to maintain even those branches which could never be profitable, such as those in remote rural areas, but provide a valuable social service...

[patman post]

And the supposed cashless society is a license to extort when so many businesses insist on minimum spends to use a card. My local Chinese takeaway for example won't let you use a card unless you spend at least £8. My nearest corner shop insists that you spend at least £3 before it will accept payment by card. My local fish and chip shop on the other hand still refuses to accept card payments at all. And not all parking meters accept card payments either and rely on you having loose change to feed in, a supply of which I keep in my car just in case.

Also, cash is just so much easier for some things. If you want to lend a tenner to a friend you just open your wallet and hand him the tenner, and he hands a tenner back in due course. To do this cashless you have to go online and access your bank account, and need to know his account details too, which is just so much more hassle.

What stops you paying in ways that have been available for most of our lives?

Cash and cheques are still available and operational. Some people used to carry both. And ATMs are fairly widespread.

And retailers have always been able to trade cash-only — but even that doesn't stop those traders from incurring charges.

Nowadays, even the jobbing painter and decorator, local plumber, travelling hairdresser, etc, can carry a card terminal, thereby making it easier for both them and the customer...

[srb7677]

The biggest service the Post Office performed was stolen from them in furtherance of the cashless society, and the small shops provision of those services subsidised UK wide went  under.

And the supposed cashless society is a license to extort when so many businesses insist on minimum spends to use a card. My local Chinese takeaway for example won't let you use a card unless you spend at least £8. My nearest corner shop insists that you spend at least £3 before it will accept payment by card. My local fish and chip shop on the other hand still refuses to accept card payments at all. And not all parking meters accept card payments either and rely on you having loose change to feed in, a supply of which I keep in my car just in case.

Also, cash is just so much easier for some things. If you want to lend a tenner to a friend you just open your wallet and hand him the tenner, and he hands a tenner back in due course. To do this cashless you have to go online and access your bank account, and need to know his account details too, which is just so much more hassle.

[johnofgwent]

Splitting the state monopoly on mail, post office, and telephones was way overdue. All three businesses needed complete overhaul and restructuring. This is now largely done.

There are now nearly 12,000 post office branches around the UK — more than all bank, building society, and credit union branches put together — and post office branches offer banking plus other services.

But even though post offices offer only one product not available elsewhere, they provide a service that many people in  both rural and urban communities rely on. In many towns, they are now open seven days a week.

Collecting and delivering letters is a diminishing business, whereas collecting parcels and more bulky goods is a growing business. Managers and staff in all Royal Mail Group businesses need to agree on those facts and plan to develop their offering accordingly...

The biggest service the Post Office performed was stolen from them in furtherance of the cashless society, and the small shops provision of those services subsidised UK wide went  under. 

[patman post]

Not a word to say of the people gaoled or the lack of investment for decades,I know for a fact because my brother was heavily involved in the updating that the criticism regarding the telephones was down to the lack of investment and the funds available were ploughed in to modernising the telephone network which once well on the way the old bat privatised and everyone  not in possession of the facts said "look what privatisation did!" well no it didn't.

Not a word to say of the debacle of failing middlemen companies that have brought nothing to the table but higher prices and cost to us,utilities should be publicly owned end of.

Free market and capitalism has its place but not on services and utilities we rely on but you'll never admit it,you just wear your thatcher blinkers that don't acknowledge the closure of gas storage,the negligence surrounding energy security,the cobblers of regulators with as many teeth as a goldfish in fact BOycey was right when he said on the thread re the list of PM's they were all to a man or woman regardless of actual party tories.

Confining myself to the old style GPO, mails and the telecoms business, my knowledge says that you're mostly correct.

But telephones had been second fiddle to mail for a century. And many GPO old stagers believed that was God's order of things. Only a few brainy engineers recognised where the future lay — and it took WWII to let some of their ideas be recognised and privatisation to allow them to catch up with the French,  who first installed fully digital public switching in 1972 — admittedly before I was born, so I'm relying on historical notes.

France also had government interference — but France had/has a history of moving government personnel between government, civil service, and industry, and a resulting cross-pollination of motivations. The UK has no such interchange So it took the splitting of mail and telecoms and privatisation in the mid-'80s to allow (kick start) widespread modernisation and updating of the UK public telephone network from electromechanical to digital, and the subsequent innovations. Many of these were dictated by innovations by competitors in the free market.

Large parts of transport, energy, steel, water, etc are currently basket cases. But having met several leaders and government-appointed regulator staff in these industries, I doubt they'd be any better if nationalised without fundamental change to their ideas of service and what they're mean to be doing...

[cromwell]

Splitting the state monopoly on mail, post office, and telephones was way overdue. All three businesses needed complete overhaul and restructuring. This is now largely done.

There are now nearly 12,000 post office branches around the UK — more than all bank, building society, and credit union branches put together — and post office branches offer banking plus other services.

But even though post offices offer only one product not available elsewhere, they provide a service that many people in  both rural and urban communities rely on. In many towns, they are now open seven days a week.

Collecting and delivering letters is a diminishing business, whereas collecting parcels and more bulky goods is a growing business. Managers and staff in all Royal Mail Group businesses need to agree on those facts and plan to develop their offering accordingly...

Not a word to say of the people gaoled or the lack of investment for decades,I know for a fact because my brother was heavily involved in the updating that the criticism regarding the telephones was down to the lack of investment and the funds available were ploughed in to modernising the telephone network which once well on the way the old bat privatised and everyone  not in possession of the facts said "look what privatisation did!" well no it didn't.

Not a word to say of the debacle of failing middlemen companies that have brought nothing to the table but higher prices and cost to us,utilities should be publicly owned end of.

Free market and capitalism has its place but not on services and utilities we rely on but you'll never admit it,you just wear your thatcher blinkers that don't acknowledge the closure of gas storage,the negligence surrounding energy security,the cobblers of regulators with as many teeth as a goldfish in fact BOycey was right when he said on the thread re the list of PM's they were all to a man or woman regardless of actual party tories.

[patman post]

Splitting the state monopoly on mail, post office, and telephones was way overdue. All three businesses needed complete overhaul and restructuring. This is now largely done.

There are now nearly 12,000 post office branches around the UK — more than all bank, building society, and credit union branches put together — and post office branches offer banking plus other services. 

But even though post offices offer only one product not available elsewhere, they provide a service that many people in  both rural and urban communities rely on. In many towns, they are now open seven days a week.

Collecting and delivering letters is a diminishing business, whereas collecting parcels and more bulky goods is a growing business. Managers and staff in all Royal Mail Group businesses need to agree on those facts and plan to develop their offering accordingly...

[cromwell]

For the first time yesterday I used the drop boxes for a parcel delivery. With the threat of further postal strikes, the local PO which I am sure is struggling, lost my business. I feel for them but drop off was nearby, easy and as long as the parcel arrives in one piece and on time I will be very happy to use it again.

It was an eye opener to see it being emptied as I waited. If some of the parcels manage to arrive safely, wrapped as they were, badly or in thin plastic that looked ready to split as soon as be looked at while being thrown around indiscriminately, I'll be surprised.

Some will say save the PO whatever the cost but where they fail others are quick to make up the difference and earn a bob or two in the process. I guess there comes a time when the old ways have to be moved on.

Well TBF the post office and Royal Mail are two separate businesses,another crap privatisation imo.

The crown offices all but disappeared and  between them and Fujitsu they managed to gaol many sub postmasters.

I read recently Bliar was made fully aware that the post office accounting software was deeply flawed but told them to press on anyway.

I know T00ts you feel politicians are subjected to unfair criticism and wonder the paucity of quality people entering politics.

They are though the authors of their own misfortune in that respect who lie at will to cover their behaviour,when you see how Bliar escaped his war crimes,Major over the blood scandal "it was just bad luck" I could go on ,are there people of principles in politics? surely but how it's all framed see them having little or no chance of making it to the top.

[T00ts]

For the first time yesterday I used the drop boxes for a parcel delivery. With the threat of further postal strikes, the local PO which I am sure is struggling, lost my business. I feel for them but drop off was nearby, easy and as long as the parcel arrives in one piece and on time I will be very happy to use it again.

It was an eye opener to see it being emptied as I waited. If some of the parcels manage to arrive safely, wrapped as they were, badly or in thin plastic that looked ready to split as soon as be looked at while being thrown around indiscriminately, I'll be surprised.

Some will say save the PO whatever the cost but where they fail others are quick to make up the difference and earn a bob or two in the process. I guess there comes a time when the old ways have to be moved on.