Royal Mail Temporary Air Carrier Supplements for even more countries

Royal Mail have announced that from the 1st of September they will be additional countries to those where Temporary Air Carrier Supplements are imposed on Business Contract products. They will also apply to a wider range of Royal Mail’s International parcel and letter services. The Temporary Air Carrier Supplements range in price from £0.52 per kilo (Slovenia) to £5.00 per kilo (Australia & New Zealand).

Royal Mail will also be reducing the cost of tracked service to the US which were previously increased to cover their additional coronavirus expenses.

“Like other delivery companies, we continue to experience steep increases in our overseas delivery costs. This is largely due to the ongoing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has led to extreme shortages in air capacity and subsequent increases in air carrier costs to most countries. We are no longer able to absorb these costs in our existing pricing.”
– Royal Mail

What this all adds up to is increasing complexity for online merchants using a business account. You will want to build Royal Mail’s Temporary Air Carrier Supplements into your pricing tables from the 1st of September, or probably a little in advance to take into account the delay between a product selling and it actually shipping. (The 1st of September is a Tuesday).

Royal Mail Temporary Air Carrier Supplements

From the 1st of September, Temporary Air Carrier Supplements will apply to Argentina, Croatia, Cyprus, Gibraltar, Iceland, India, Israel, Lithuania, Mexico, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Slovenia, and the United Arab Emirates.

This is in addition to countries where the supplements are already charged – Australia, Brazil, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, South Africa, South Korea, and the USA.

Royal Mail Temporary Air Carrier Supplements – Products

The products covered by the Royal Mail Temporary Air Carrier Supplements vary by country but can include Untracked (Standard, Maxsort, Print Direct), Tracked, Tracked & Signed, and Signed Only. Full details and exact pricing by country/product are available on the Royal Mail website.

Price reductions for Royal Mail Tracked Service to the USA

Royal Mail increased the prices of International parcel services to USA in July, and stated that they would be closely monitoring the cost of conveyance and that may reduce prices accordingly in the future. From the 1st of September 2020 Royal Mail will be reducing the cost of this service.