MP goes to Parliament over 'utter failings' by Royal Mail in Leighton Buzzard - resulting in missed health appointments and lost cheques

Concerns have been raised in Parliament over ‘utter failings’ by Royal Mail in Leighton Buzzard.

South West Bedfordshire MP, Andrew Selous told House of Commons Leader Penny Mordaunt that some residents had not had post for six weeks and said despite the ‘excellent efforts’ of postmen and women, the management of the Royal Mail in Leighton Buzzard is ‘failing utterly’, resulting in missed health appointments and missing cheques among other issues.

He said: “What can the Government do to ensure that my constituents have a decent postal service, can get to their medical appointments on time, receive cheques through the post and get a proper postal service?”

Ms Mordaunt assured the relevant ministers would be made aware of the poor service being received and pointed out that healthcare should not solely be relying on letters to notify patients of appointments.

She added: “There is of course the NHS app, which is good progress, but many people, particularly older people, will not have a smartphone, so picking up the good old-fashioned telephone is certainly an option they should consider. I shall make sure that both Ministers have heard his concerns.”

Other concerns Mr Selous has been made aware of include a resident with severe mobility issues being told to go down to the sorting office to collect her own post, significant delays to parcels and letters weeks after posting, missed medical appointments, financial hardship due to missing cheques and residents being spoken to rudely on the phone and being told missing post is their problem and not the Royal Mail’s.

Mr Selous said he respected post workers but management in the town needed to be dealt with over what he said was an “the appalling service”.

He told the Observer: “I have the highest respect for our hard-working post women and men. I have been out with them on their rounds and have visited our sorting offices in Leighton Buzzard and Dunstable almost every Christmas. I have seen a much better service from the Dunstable sorting office over the years than has been delivered in Leighton Buzzard. I am calling on Royal Mail to deal with this failure properly with greatly improved management in Leighton Buzzard.”

A Royal Mail spokesperson said: “We are sorry to residents in Leighton Buzzard who have experienced delays. Improving our quality of service is our top priority and we are committed to restoring service levels to where our customers expect them to be.

“The service in the area has recently been impacted by higher levels of sick absence and vacancies in roles. We have a recruitment plan in place and expect to be fully staffed in the near future.

“When a delay occurs, we make every effort to ensure it has as little impact on the customer as possible. Those who do not receive their mail on the day they expect will always be prioritised the next day.

“Across our business we have plans in place to drive service levels and reduce absence at our delivery offices, we hope and expect to see further progress in the coming months."