Around 6,500 postal workers are off sick every day at a cost of £200million a year, Royal Mail’s chief executive has revealed.
Martin Seidenberg, the boss of International Distribution Services (IDS), which owns Royal Mail, said the business wanted to be at the ‘vanguard’ of efforts to tackle the nation’s economic inactivity.
‘It has a cost to us, and of course an impact to you,’ Mr Seidenberg said at a panel in London.
In response to staff absences, IDS has given its 130,000 employees 24-hour access to an online GP.
‘We believe that the sooner our people have access to medical support, the sooner they’re likely to return to the job,’ Mr Seidenberg told The Times CEO Summit.
He spoke alongside former John Lewis chairman Sir Charlie Mayfield, who last year led the Government’s Keep Britain Working review, and revealed the need to tackle Britain’s ‘economic inactivity crisis’.
It comes as more than one in five working-age people are unemployed and not looking for a job.
Mr Seidenberg also warned that Britain’s education system is not equipping children with the technology skills needed to move into work.
Royal Mail said it had been a challenging start to the year, and that storms Goretti and Chandra, as well as more staff calling in sick from the flu, had affected its performance over the winter
‘They’re tech-savvy these kids,’ he said. ‘But we feel they’re not taught the tools that really make a difference for a company.
‘I would urge the education sector to assess what can be done to teach youngsters what AI is about, and not just how to become a TikTok star.
He added that it was important to educate youngsters on the realities of hard graft, saying ‘We tell them, as a postie, you can’t work from home.’
His comments come after the regulator Ofcom this month opened an investigation into Royal Mail’s failure to meet delivery targets for another year running.
Despite its pledge to invest £500million in improving its service, Royal Mail said it had been a challenging start to the year, and that storms Goretti and Chandra, as well as more staff calling in sick from the flu, had affected its performance over the winter.
Around 75.7 per cent of first-class mail arrived the next working day, according to the latest quality of service report, which was slightly less than the 76.3 per cent a year earlier.
For second-class mail, 90.2 per cent was delivered within three working days – less than the 92.2 per cent achieved the year before.
Under the watchdog’s targets, 90 per cent of first-class mail should be delivered the next day, and 95 per cent of second-class mail should be delivered within three days.
Royal Mail was fined £21million by Ofcom in October last year for missing its annual targets – the third-largest fine ever imposed by the communications watchdog.
Sickness has been plaguing service across the public sector, too. Earlier this month, it was revealed that the NHS is losing the equivalent of 80,000 staff to sickness absence, which costs taxpayers £4.6billion a year.
Experts warned that exceptionally generous sick pay is fuelling the crisis, often to the detriment of patients on waiting lists.
And the absent workers could fully staff 80 additional hospitals, according to the NHS, Heal Thyself report.
