Postal union plans legal action as Lovefilm commits to Royal Mail

by Noelle McElhatton, marketingdirectmag.co.uk 27-Oct-09, 11:08

LONDON - The Communication Workers Union (CWU) is going to the High Court to stop Royal Mail using temporary workers to clear the post backlog caused by the strikes.

The news comes as home delivery DVD rental business Lovefilm vowed to continue to use Royal Mail despite disruptions from postal strikes.

The CWU and Royal Mail spent seven hours in talks to resolve the dispute yesterday, negotiations that have resumed today. TUC brokers who were present at the meeting described it as "useful".

Royal Mail had planned on hiring 30,000 temporary workers to deal with the backlog of post and the Christmas rush, insisting this is within the law. The CWU believes it can show that Royal Mail is breaking employment law.

Meanwhile Lovefilm CEO Simon Calver said Royal Mail's service had been a key part of the firm's growth over recent years. It relies on Royal Mail to deliver DVDs to customers' homes in a one-piece mailer that includes a pre-paid option for returning the DVDs. It also uses direct mail as a CRM tool for its high value customers.

Lovefilm - the online brand that loves direct mail

Royal Mail says its backlog will have fallen from 30 million to five million items since last week's strikes. However a postal worker blogger for the Guardian, who writes under the pseudonym ‘Roy Mayall,' claimed that trolleys were full of ‘junk mail' the morning before last week's national strike.

"I noticed something very odd, though, on the day before the first of the strikes," the blogger writes. "All of the trolleys used to wheel the mail around the office - which we call "coffins" because of their size and shape - were backed into the corner, full up with mail.

He goes on to write: "Mailsort, a form of third-class corporate mail... is the stuff with the big "M" in the corner. Our corporate clients use it for bulk deliveries and mass mail-outs. It's very cheap and usually full of stuff no one needs. Junk mail in other words. That was what the coffins were full of the morning before the strike. Are the corporations helping the Royal Mail to break the strike by bailing it out with a lot of junk mail? It makes an interesting scenario."

Royal Mail would not comment on the blog except to say that "the majority of our postal workers know and appreciate the value of direct mail to the business".

Up to 120,000 CWU members will stage three 24-hour strikes from Thursday if no deal on pay and conditions is reached.