Letters face weeks of delays as thousands of postal workers go sick or self-isolate

A spokesman said: “We are providing targeted support to the local offices affected by these issues and we apologise to customers for any inconvenience they may have experienced.

“Our postmen and women are continuing to work incredibly hard, as they have done throughout the pandemic, and we are thankful for all of their efforts and determination.”

The company, which has 1,200 sorting offices, insisted it is operating as normal across most of the country. 

In a bid to battle the backlog, it is bringing in temporary workers, offering staff more overtime and has temporarily cut the frequency of deliveries in some areas.

But it risks breaching the “universal service obligation”, a legal duty which is supposed to ensure deliveries within a certain time, after being hit with delays last year as well.

Under the obligation, Royal Mail is supposed to deliver 93pc of all first-class post within one working day of collection and 98.5pc of second-class post within three working days.

It will be measured for the financial year to the end of March, but performance is only being assessed for September, October, November, January, February and March this year owing to pandemic exemptions. December is never counted. 

If the average delivery times for those six months are found to be below standard, Royal Mail could face a fine from media regulator Ofcom. It was previously fined £1.5m for missing targets in 2018/19. 

A spokesman for Ofcom said officials are closely monitoring the company’s performance.

He added: “We have made it clear to the company that it must improve as the impacts of the pandemic subside.”

One postal worker in the South East described the scenes playing out in sorting offices as “chaos”.

They said: “There is not enough space, so managers are saying ‘leave the letters and get rid of these parcels first’.”

The postal delays have triggered a slew of complaints to Royal Mail and its management, including chairman Keith Williams and UK chief Simon Thompson.

In one example, the leader of Buckinghamshire council said he had written to Mr Williams to complain that a resident had received 24 Christmas cards all at once on January 5. 

“Infrequent and unpredictable” service had prompted long queues of residents outside the sorting office in Amersham, which only opens between 8am and 10am, hoping to personally collect essential mail, he added.

Royal Mail refused to say how big the current backlog of letters and parcels was on Tuesday.