Royal Mail has launched a bonus scheme in order to incentivise staff to meet its Christmas delivery targets.
As part of the scheme, employees will be able to earn up to £500 extra if they hit local and national quality targets.
Royal Mail’s renamed parent organisation, International Distributions Services, decided to implement the initiative to try to avoid further delays and disrupted deliveries following previous strike action.
This week, International Distributions Services reported its results for the half-year ended 24 September 2023, in which its losses more than doubled in the first half of the financial year. It was also fined £5.6 million by Ofcom for missing letter delivery targets, as only 74% of first-class letters arrived on time in the 2022-23 financial year, as opposed to its 93% statutory target.
Martin Seidenberg, chief executive officer of International Distributions Services, said: “From experience, I know that quality is key for customer satisfaction and sustainable growth, so we are pulling out all the stops to deliver Christmas for our customers. This includes recruiting 16,000 seasonal workers, opening five temporary sorting centres and launching an incentive scheme for operational employees worth up to £500 each for hitting local and national quality targets.
“We have a clear plan for improvement longer term, including reinforcing operational management at a regional and local level, and recruiting faster than ever before, reducing reliance on agency workers. A number of changes we secured in the agreement with the Communication Workers Union, such as new sickness and attendance policies, will also help to underpin quality. We’re making good progress implementing that agreement, but our change agenda is wider and will take time.”