This week sees Royal Mail increase the cost of a first class stamp from to 44p to 60p in the largest increase it has ever made. A second class stamp will rise from 34p to 50p, also up 14p (and therefore 39%). It is unclear how Royal Mail expect to reassure the general public that an increase of this magnitude is justified, especially considering usage of the service has already dropped off from 84 million items being handled by Royal Mail per day to 25 million in the last five years. With the closure of thousands of local post offices and the loss of the early morning delivery, is this another echoing clang of the final nail being driven home?

As always, we need to consider the impact on business users. For a small business sending, on average, 35 letters per week, the annual cost of postage will rise from £618.80 to £1092. Scale up the amount of letters sent and the figures get scary. If you send, on average 100 letters per week your costs will rise from £1768 to £3120 per annum. In effect you will be paying more for a lesser service.

So, should this be the push we all need to go paperless? More and more businesses are reducing the amount of paper they use in their offices and this could be the incentive we need to go one step further. If you aren’t already using email as your main form of contact then WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! Save yourself money and time and come gently into the new century, it won’t bite.