Royal Mail introduces ‘click and collect’ service for small businesses
The Royal Mail has begun phasing in a new ‘click and collect’ service to 20,000 small and medium sized businesses as it moves to capitalise on its burgeoning parcels business.
Customers will now be able to collect packages up directly from any of 10,500 Post Office branches nationwide to capitalise on the online shopping boom.
Click and collect follows increasingly potent competition from Amazon in the delivery market with the online retailer investing in a fleet of its own delivery vans to bring deliveries in-house at the expense of the Royal mail.
Together with the introduction of secure collection lockers this threatens the six per cent of Royal Mail’s parcel business which is directly linked to Amazon trade.
Royal Mail’s share price has come under pressure in light of these fears in recent weeks as investors take stock of this threat to its business model, seen as vital to plug the gap opened up by a decline in letter writing.