Royal Mail

Royal Mail is the United Kingdom's primary postal operator, with a history stretching back to 1516 when King Henry VIII established the first national postal service. Today operating as part of International Distribution Services (IDS) — acquired by Czech billionaire Daniel Křetínský's EP Group in 2025 — Royal Mail remains the UK's universal service provider, obligated by law to deliver letters and parcels to every address in the country at uniform rates.

Company Overview

Royal Mail employs over 100,000 people across the UK and handles billions of postal items each year. Key operational facts:

• Delivers to approximately 32 million addresses six days a week across the UK
• Handles around 8–10 billion letters and parcels annually
• Operates 50,000+ electric vehicles, one of the largest EV delivery fleets in Europe
• Has a target to be carbon zero by 2040
• Parcel revenues growing as letter volumes decline (letter volume has fallen ~40% over the past decade)

Royal Mail met its Christmas 2024 delivery target with over 99% of items sent before the last posting dates arriving on time.

Key Services

Royal Mail Tracked 24 / Tracked 48: The core parcel services for e-commerce businesses, offering next-day (24) or two-day (48) delivery with full end-to-end tracking. These services replaced the older First and Second Class Parcels products.

Special Delivery Guaranteed: Time-definite express service with compensation for late delivery. Available in 1pm and 9am options, with cover up to £2,500.

Signed For: Additional tracked service add-on for standard letters and small parcels requiring a delivery signature.

International services: Royal Mail offers Tracked, Signed, and untracked international services via the Airmail and International Standard networks. Parcels traveling to Europe often pass through the Parcelforce Worldwide subsidiary for larger, heavier items.

Click & Drop: Royal Mail's online postage platform for e-commerce sellers, integrating with Shopify, eBay, Amazon, WooCommerce, and other platforms to generate labels and manifests at business rates.

Tracking

Royal Mail tracking numbers are typically 13 characters in the format: 2 letters + 8 numbers + 2 letters (e.g., JD123456789GB). Tracking is available at royalmail.com and through third-party aggregators.

For more information on how to track shipments and manage your deliveries, use our tracking form.