Posties to deliver pre-printed labels as part of Parcel Collect service

Royal Mail staff will now deliver pre-printed postage labels to customers who need them when using the company’s Parcel Collect service.

The move enables customers without a printer to use Parcel Collect, where postmen and women collect parcels for delivery while carrying out their delivery round.

Under Parcel Collect, customers arrange for their postie to collect their parcel from their doorstep. Customers using the service simply have to book a collection online then signal whether they would like to order a self-adhesive, pre-printed postage label to affix to their parcel. As part of the service, postmen and postwomen will collect a parcel from the customer’s door or nominated safe place.

Parcel Collect also enables online sellers and online shoppers to mail or return a pre-paid item by post from home. The Parcel Collect service is available six days a week and can be booked up to five days in advance and up to midnight the day before. It costs an additional 60p per item, in addition to postage costs.

Nick Landon, chief commercial officer at Royal Mail, said: “Every day our posties walk past every house in the country at about the same time. People know when their postie is going to deliver and now they can send or return parcels at the same time. If people aren’t going to be in, they can leave their item in a safe place for our postie to collect it and now if they don’t have a printer at home, they can ask their postie to bring the label with them.”

The nationwide launch of label-less collections follows a trial of the service in four areas of the UK earlier in the year.