Royal Mail hires 3,000 to help cards get home for Christmas

by Staff, Brand Republic 11-Dec-06, 07:00

LONDON - Three thousand extra staff have been recruited by Royal Mail to help decipher poorly written addresses on Christmas cards and letters this year.

Royal Mail estimates that it will handle 400m items that its automated sorting machinery will not be able to be read as a result of missed postcodes, bad handwriting or poorly addressed envelopes.

Dubbed "address detectives", the 3,000 recruits will work alongside the 1,400-strong team that already has to try and work out where people want to send their mail.

It has also added new features to its online postcode finder in an attempt to encourage better use of addresses, upping the number of free postcode checks that can be made in one day from 12 to 20 and adding a street map to let people double check addresses.

Alex Batchelor, marketing director at Royal Mail, said: "Mail volumes almost double on peak days in December and it is important that people properly address their Christmas cards and use the postcode. Letters and cards that have clearly written addresses and a postcode can be read by our machines and handled 20 times faster than by hand."

If you have an opinion on this or any other issue raised on Brand Republic, join the debate in the Forum.