New Royal Mail postage rates from 30 March 2015 - some losers, but many winners.

As expected Royal Mail have announced the new tariff for inland and international post to take effect from 30 March 2015. Under the current regulatory regime the company is required to give 30 days notice of any material changes.

While there are expected small increases in some rates, there are significant reductions in others and a further restructuring of international letter and inland parcel rates and weights.

Headline changes

Inland 1^st and 2^nd class letters rise by 1p to 63p and 54p respectively.

1^st class Large Letters rise by 2p to 95p and 2^nd class by 1p to 74p.

Royal Mail signed for fee remains £1.10 and there are small rises in Special Delivery rates.

The basic International letter rate rises as expected to £1 from 97p. This covers European letters up to 20g, Worldwide letters up to 10g and postcards. In a further restructuring the 60g weight step is abolished with the new rates for 100g being only slightly more than the present rates for 60g, so a significant 35% reduction on the present 100g rates.   The surface mail rate rises from 81p to 85p.

  

A new category of International Large Letter is introduced with four weight steps from 100g to 750g. This replaces the current small parcel up to 100g and offers a welcome reduction in that rate, from £3.20 / £3.80 / £4.00 for Europe / World Zone 1 / World Zone 2 to £2.45 / £3.15 / £3.45.

For inland parcels the trial £2.80 rate for 2nd Class Small Parcels up to 2kg is retained on a permanent basis. For Medium Parcels the 1^st class rates are unchanged, but 2^nd class rates are reduced with a single rate up to 2kg of £4.89, down from £5.20 for 1kg and £8.00 for 2kg, a saving of 38%!

New stamps - update: details of new stamps are shown here

No new stamps are required for the inland letter rates, nor the Signed For or Special Delivery rates. New stamps for international letters will be

£1.33 replacing £1.28 for World 20g

£1.52 replacing £1.47 for Europe 60g becoming 100g

£2.25 replacing £2.15 for Worldwide 60g which becomes 100g

Whilst no new £1 Machin stamp is required Royal Mail may take the opportunity to change the colour again, despite some Post Office branches still selling the £1 ruby! There will be new £1 country definitives in the Oak Tree, Lace, Thistle and Daffodil designs.

Post and Go / Self-Service Kiosks

The biggest change for collectors comes in the Post and Go Faststamps which will see service indicators change again. The overall cost of a collectors set rises from £7.42 to £7.68. Will we see the installation of new static machines before the new tariff takes effect?  (They wouldn't be that cynical would they?)

Service	2014/15	2015/16
1st class 100g	62p	63p
1st Large 100g	93p	95p
Euro20/World10	97p	£1.00
Europe 60g*	£1.47	£1.52
Worldwide 20g	£1.28	£1.33
Worldwide 60g*	£2.15	£2.25

* changing to 100g

It is to be hoped that the cupboards full of old Faststamp stock have all been used up and we will not see the appearance of everything from Birds 1 to Winter Greenery with the new service indicators. As Wincor-Nixdorf machines are supposed to be out of service by the time the new tariff is in force the only changes will be on NCR Self-Service Kiosks and IAR's Royal Mail II machines at exhibitions and static locations.

The new tariff leaflet can be downloaded as a pdf file from Royal Mail's website.

News of the colours etc of new stamps will be published when provided by Royal Mail - see http://blog.norphil.co.uk/2015/03/new-2015-postage-rates-more-new-stamps.html

UPDATE  31 March
Preparing my first International Tracked and Signed despatch of the week, I find that a subtle change has been introduced which will require authors who publish postal history rates tables to reassess how they present information. Until the new rates came into operation on 30th March, the additional cost of International Signed, International Tracked and Signed, and International Tracked could be regarded as a fee because, leaving aside the inclusion of VAT for International Tracked to EU countries, the additional cost for all of these services was a flat £5 per item.

When I looked at the new rates I thought that the £5 had been retained.  And indeed for 'Letters' it has: a 20g Tracked and Signed Letter costs £6 to Europe and £6.33 to the rest of the world.  But for Large Letters and Small Parcels things have changed and the additional cost varies according to the item and the weight.

For instance a 100g Large Letter costs £2.45 by Standard mail, but £8.70 by Tracked and Signed, a premium of £5.65.  But the price of a Large Letter weighing 500-750g is £11.00 by TandS compared with £6.60 by Standard - a premium of only £4.40.  The premium for Small Parcels and Printed Papers varies from £4.75 at the first weight step to £3.50 for the top 2kg band.

This leaves small businesses who use flat-rate postage with a problem of how to set their new postage charges, and means that postal historians of the future will need to know the whole table, rather than applying simply the standard postage plus a fixed premium.

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BFPS Marks Centenary of RAF Northolt with special cover

RAF Northolt - 100 years of Aviation History

One hundred years of service (95 as a military flying station), means that RAF Northolt, based in South Ruislip is a reflection of aviation history. Northolt pre-dates the establishment of the Royal Air Force by almost three years, having opened in May 1915. It has the longest history of continuous use of any RAF airfield. More recently it has become a multipurpose Tri-service base serving the growing needs of a modern Armed Forces.

To mark this historic centenary the British Forces Philatelic Bureau, in conjunction RAF Northolt, has produced a special commemorative cover that will be released on the 3ʳᵈ March 2015. The cover image uses the spoke from the station badge to depict the various units and activities that are now part of the base. This issue will include a limited edition of 500 flown covers, some of which will be signed by the Station Commander and Officer Commanding Operations Wing.

Most of the covers have been reserved for RAF Northolt, however BFPS has secured a limited quantity for sale to its customers. The covers may be purchased from the BFPS online shop (www.bfps.org.uk/shop). These will cost just £6 (UK/BFPO postfree) for the unsigned version, £8 for the flown only and £12 for the signed versions. They are available to order now on a strictly first-come-first-served basis. The covers are also available by post by sending a cheque (payable to ‘BFPS CIC’) to BFPS, The Old Post Office, Links Place, Elie, Fife, KY9 1AX, United Kingdom.

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The Guernsey Post and Go Stamps Stampex Project.

Readers of a certain age, whether or not they were directly involved with IT systems will probably recall the frustration of the differences between what the specification showed, what was programmed and what the user actually wanted, summed up in this widely distributed cartoon or a version of it.

This probably 40-year old cartoon came to mind as I travelled back on the train from Stampex yesterday evening, having found that things there were not totally as expected.  So here is my version:

#1. How the customer planned it.
Guernsey Flag stamps with normal Guernsey Service Indicators: GY for Bailliwick and UK for UK mail.   The plan was for the machine at Stampex to include a Spring Stampex February 2015 inscription.

#2. What the contractor delivered - Stampex inscription on Guernsey Flag stamps.
Note the service indicators for Bailliwick mail are the same as were produced for Jersey Post, "Local Letter" and "Local Large".  It would have made more sense to use the shorthand form that Guernsey islanders and visitors are used to.

#3. What the Bureau advertised ...
... what we advertised, and so what our customers ordered -  as #1 and #2 but both in vertical strips of 6.

#4 What the Facilitator decided ...
... and what the machine dispensed.  Stampex inscription on Union Flag stamps, but not on Guernsey Flag stamps.  [Jersey stamps were sold without a Stampex inscription when they first appeared at Stampex, and 'somebody' decided that this was a precedent which should be followed, despite announcements and advertisements suggesting otherwise, and despite the initial supplies to the island being with Stampex inscription!  Although this should have been a Guernsey Post decision, it seems that Royal Mail had a strong influence in the result.]

#6. What this customer thought.

Having asked customers for their orders I have obtained what I think they will want, and the extra versions which were not as advertised.  Of course it may be that some people will have ordered some strips direct from the Bureau, as they were not expected to be on sale at Stampex.*

If this happened with Royal Mail stamps, it would be less of a problem, because any surplus can be used for postage.  But despite my best efforts at making sure than I knew what was happening, including telephoning the island to double-check, I am likely to be left with surplus Guernsey stamps.

* Orders will be processed early next week.

Postscript:
Rumours at Stampex yesterday suggested that both the Isle of Man and Gibraltar postal administrations would introduce Post and Go machines either at Europhilex or Autumn Stampex.

UPDATE 24 February
The latest comment (below) led me to think more about the changes, and misinformation.

If the decision to go with plain Guernsey Flag stamps meant that the Union Flag GG stamp had the 'Stampex' inscription, that probably explains why the Royal Mail machines switched the 'Stampex' inscription from Machin to Union Flag stamps.  It would not have been right to have Guernsey printing 'Stampex' on the Flag if RM were not.

But we were told about the switch from Machins on 5 February, so there was plenty of time for Guernsey Post and IAR to change the pre-issue information about what they were producing.  It begs the question just how early the Guernsey Back Office flagstamps (WITH the Stampex inscription) were printed.  If the decision was taken before 5 February, why was the Guernsey bureau supplied with Stampex-inscribed Guernsey Flag stamps, given that there was then 2 weeks to Stampex?

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More slogan postmarks but too late for collectors

This week there have been two more slogan postmarks in use at Mail Centres with IMP and iLSM ink-jet machines.  Oddly the first was mentioned in Royal Mail News on the myRoyalMail website, but not in the press release which received some mainstream media coverage, and the second does not seem to have been announced at all, although it FDC collectors would have appreciated advance notice.  One day Royal Mail (Group - all the disparate elements that make up what is supposed to be a major communications company) will communicate with each other and realise that there are revenue benefits to effective publicity - minor ones, but nonetheless they exist.

The announcement at 0300 on 19 February on myRoyalMail was for the Chinese New Year and included:

A special postmark will also appear today on all stamped UK and international mail.
It will read “Happy Chinese New Year 2015” and will feature a translation in Mandarin Chinese.

Sadly this was too late for collectors to post letters to get the postmark.  Two versions exist, shown here from machine 1 at Medway Mail Centre (iLSM) and Lancashire and South Lakes (IMP):

I was told that a series of 8 slogans would be in use in conjunction with the Inventive Britain stamps.  So far the only ones seen have celebrated Percy Shaw and his Catseyes.

Again, myRoyalMail indicates that there will be special postmarks over this week and next and Royal Mail van displays.  This announcement was also at 0300 on 19 February, so too late to get a first day cover with the slogan unless you were fortunate enough to see the announcement.

Update from Press Release:
In addition to the stamps, Royal Mail will also be issuing special ‘Inventive Britain’ postmarks across the country from 20-28 February. Post across the country will (except Sunday) will be stamped with a message dedicated to one of the inventions.

Also, in locations where there are strong links to the inventors, Royal Mail vans will feature an image of the relevant stamp from the ‘Inventive Britain’ issue. They are; Halifax; Epsom; Sheffield; Edinburgh; Cirencester; Dumfries; Docklands and Mortlake. 


Inventive Britain Stamps, Catseyes, Percy Shaw.
Lancashire and South Lakes on the Catseyes stamp, a first day cover:

and a day early from machine 6 at Medway MC (18 February):

 

Thanks to John C, John E and Bob M for alerting me to these.  More examples will be shown on the Stampboards Forum for inclusion in the British Postmarks Database - an excellent searchable resource.

Further Inventive Britain postmarks:

Stainless Steel, Harry Brearley - Mount Pleasant (?) 19-02-2015

DNA Sequencing, Frederick Sanger - Glasgow 21-02-2015 and Bristol 21.02.15

 

Fibre Optics, Charles Kao + George Hockham - Greenford/Windsor 23.02.15, and Swindon 23-02-2015

Carbon Fibre,William Watt - Bristol 24.02.15 and Swindon 24-02-2015

i-Limb, David Gow - Manchester Mail Centre 25.02.15

Colossus, Tommy Flowers - SE Wales 26.02.15

World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee - SE Wales 27.02.15

More to come - please continue sending them - and thanks to Bob, Robert, John E, John G and another John E!  And peterh on Stampboards.

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The thin end of the wedge at Crewe and Bradford: Time to Stop the Gimmicks?

It is with great sadness that I report that Royal Mail has followed the lead of Jersey Post and is now using location identifiers in the new Post and Go machines at their Delivery Offices.

I've been sent these pictures from the new machine installed at Crewe today (thanks SL) and have no reason to believe that the Bradford ones will not be similar. 

The 2nd class are MA12 and the 1st class MA13.

We reported earlier that the new M series machines would be installed today to replace A003 and A004 which are going to Stampex and then on to new (Museum?) venues.

UPDATE 12 February
I can now show the Bradford North stamps; the lucky buyer also got a bonus with blanks at the start of his strips.   My advice with these would always be to keep them as they are.

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Union Flag Post and GO Faststamp Pack Reprinted.

It has recently come to our attention that the Union Flag Faststamp in the Bureau pack has been reprinted with a different font and layout.  As far as I can see, there is no change to the carrier in the pack.

The original is shown above the current version.

The content of the datastring and service indicator is the same, but the second line is now left-justified in line with the first line.  In addition the shape of the lettering of 1st Class up to 100g is much different, and there are slight changes to the shape of the digits in the datastring.

It seems that the first type also exists with the text spacing from the left margin varying considerably, but otherwise the same.

In the original pack, issued on 21 May 2012, the printing is the same as that on stamps in the Farm Animals packs.  This format continued until the Symbolic Flowers pack of September 2014 on which the printing has the same characteristics as the lower stamp shown above.

The new pack is on sale here.

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St Valentine's turn for a special slogan postmark

As expected, the special slogan postmarks for Burns Night and Wales' love-saint St Dwynwen are followed by yet another unannounced slogan for St Valentine.

So far only seen from Chester Mail Centre, our thanks to Adrian for this one, in use last Saturday, 7th February 2015.  I suppose we can expect to see this all week until Friday 13th.  Mail from Peterborough MC on 7th had the 'Stroke association' postmark, as did mail from South Midlands MC on 6th.

Examples of the other format are now arriving, thanks to our readers.  This is the best example so far:

But none of them is particularly clear

Stampex Post and Go - all change

An announcement just received from Royal Mail

Stampex Overprint

The Stampex overprint ‘ Spring Stampex February 2015’, which was originally scheduled to be applied to the Machin Post and Go stamp will now be switched to the Union Flag design.

I'll be writing to customers who have placed orders for these.

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More Post and Go Roundup - more Oddities.

Several collectors have sent reports of oddities from several different Post and Go machines: I've been waiting for an opportunity to tell you about these, and now that there are several to report, it seems an appropriate time.


1. At Yeovil machine 68 is printing significantly (9 mm) to the right.  These were produced on 15 January.  The Winter Greenery stamps have now been replaced by 2nd class Machins (MA13), but the fault continues.

UPDATE 
I've been reminded by DP that a similar error was shown last July.  Then the error was at Lavender Hill in Battersea [019001], in May: also on 68.  It also happened on machine 68 at Earl's Court [006008].  So, is there a problem with machines number 68?  Other reports are most welcome!

2. DPwrites:

"At Tudor Street yesterday both the machines that were working only vended 5 values (no Euro20g/World 10g), but charged for 6, just as the NCR machines did last year with the introduction of the 60g values. Strangely, the machine was able to vend the euro20g/World 10g on its own or with other values but not as part of the pre-programed collectors set option, images attached.

According to the manager at Farringdon Road, the software was updated a couple of months ago, and you only pay for the 5 values, the receipt does not support that view"

Surprisingly, one of the machines is still dispensing Robins [MA13].  As you can see (click on the image for a larger version) there is a 'nick' at the foot of the Europe 60g stamp: this is normally associated with the end of a strip of 5or one of the two strips of 3 - these are Wincor-Nixdorf machines.

 
"DP also has the set from Southport with the same problem (vended 29/1/15), bought from eBay. The same seller also has examples from Keighley (vended 28/1/15) with the original Europe 20g value. Keighley’s machine seems to have been reset late November; on 29/11/14 it was on session 00436 with the original Europe up to 20g according to an ebay seller's photo. On 20 October 2014 it was on 04586 vending the dual value stamp."

John E has sent a further picture of the Southport error on 02/02/15, session number 02420.  [42 purchase sessions between 15.45 on Thursday 29 Jan and 13.12 on Monday 2 Feb - not exactly overused is it?  I suspect this machine will not be replaced at the end of March when they are all decommissioned!]

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The status of London’s Wincor-Nixdorf machines 2/02/15 was

100003  Farringdon Road

(1)          Machin MA13    Collectors set status not checked, manager said 5 values only

100003  Tudor Street

(2)          Robin MA12       Machine failed to vend dual value stamp in collectors set

(3)          Sheep                  Machine failed to vend dual value stamp in collectors set

(4)          Out of Service

042005  Swiss Cottage

(1)          Out of service

032004  Holloway

(1)          Out of Service    Machine is now hidden behind a display of cards

As DP writes, the last few months of the Wincor-Nixdorf machines will not be as simple as we may have hoped!

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Post and Go News from the BPMA and other Museums

Coinciding with Spring Stampex at the Business Design Centre, there will also be changes to the Post and Go output from The British Postal Museum and Archive (BPMA).

On Wednesday 18 February 2015, to celebrate the bicentenary of the birth of novelist and pillar box pioneer Anthony Trollope, The BPMA will be using a special commemorative inscription on Post and Go stamps.


The Trollope inscription will be printed on the standard and second class Machin, and will feature an illustration of the BPMA’s Channel Islands pillar box from c.1853, which will also be in the Museum foyer.

The text for the underprint will read: ‘The B.P.M.A. Trollope 200’. The Union Flag stamps, also dispensed from the Post and Go+ machine, will not feature the commemorative inscription.  A range of philatelic products featuring the Trollope issue including presentation packs and first day covers, will be available from the BPMA online shop. (The datastring should be A2GB--)

As well as the commemorative inscription, the BPMA is undertaking a number of other activities to celebrate the Trollope bicentenary including a touring exhibition and a talk by BPMA Senior Curator, Julian Stray. Further details can be found on the BPMA website.

The stamps will be available from the BPMA foyer during standard opening hours until 5pm on Thursday 30 April.


Thank you to all those who have sent comments telling of the news that is being published both by Royal Mail and IAR.  This piecemeal dribbling of news by the authorities makes cohesive reporting very difficult, so apologies if some of your comments are being rejected rather than published.  I am grateful and will try to consolidate all the comments into the main blog post.

UPDATE 4 February
The Royal Marines Museum and National Museum of the Royal Navy have advised that they do not expect the content of their Post and Go machines to change, so are not expecting to have the Working Sail stamps. 

UPDATE 4/5 February
Machines A003 and A004 will make a last appearance at Stampex this month and will relocate to become static machines, A003 in March and A004 later.  

Meanwhile the IAR site shows machines A007-A010 which are awaiting allocation, currently being in store at Twickenham.  It also shows A005 (not at Stampex in 2015) is shown as a development machine in Bristol although it was at Spring and Autumn Stampex in 2014 and is now at the Royal Marines Museum. (Perhaps the site has too many pages for one person to keep up-to-date?  I know the feeling!)

I have yet to hear Royal Mail's reasoning for having the static machines which have cryptic or trite inscriptions on the labels at anything other than philatelic or postal locations.  Most collectors know of The BPMA but how many people refer to The NMRN, or The RMM.  What next? Portsmouth Historic Dockyard is always referred to as HMNB - Her Majesty's Naval Base so The PHD would be inappropriate.  In any case, the NMRN is included under the HMNB umberlla, and the RMM is dealt with within the HMNB website.  The same person at the base is responsible for Post and Go operations at both museums.

I'd really like to hear from somebody who visits either museum as a tourist, with observations on just who buys these stamps and where they post them, for surely ordinary tourists don't buy these rather dull stamps just as souvenirs of their visit?

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More Machines Materialise at Crewe and Bradford

Royal Mail have announced an extension to the Post and Go Enquiry Office Trial first reported in November.

The placement of Post and Go machines in the Royal Mail Enquiry Offices at Crewe and Bradford North seems to have been reasonably successful so far, and is to be extended for a further 6 months. 

Due to exhibition requirements the two existing kiosks will be replaced by two new kiosks, M002 in Crewe and M003 in Bradford North, and will carry location IDs “Crewe” and “Bradford N” respectively. 

The kiosks will be changed over on the 9^th February and should be available from 14:00 in Crewe and 16:00 in Bradford North.  They will both carry 1^st and 2^nd Class Machins.   According to the Royal Mail statement it is expected that the new M (Mails) series kiosks will develop further to offer other Enquiry Office services.

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