We recently consulted with contract holders on changes we are making to the composition of some Standard Selection Codes (SSCs), as part of the Royal Mail Network Window changes. I would like to thank customers for providing their valuable feedback.

As a reminder from 1 April 2025 there will be changes to :

1. 86-way sortation: The content of several SSCs will change. In particular proportions of some Scottish postcodes will move to SSC 312. Also ZE postcode will move to SSC 312 which is aligned to Glasgow. This means from 1 April 2025, mail for SSC 312 will need to be presented at Glasgow; and
2. 48-way sortation: Currently SSCs 310 and 312 are combined and aligned to Aberdeen. From 1 April 2025, SSCs 310 and 312 will be separated so there will be 49 selections in total. This means that mail for SSC 312 will need to be presented at Glasgow from 1 April 2025 and mail for SSC 310 shall continue to be presented at Aberdeen. Additionally, SSC 364, which is currently combined with SSC 363, will be combined with SSC 357 but continues to be aligned to Chelmsford.

It was encouraging to hear that customers felt the changes would have a low impact on their own operations. Understandably customers have requested that we make available the Access Selection Files and Customer Final Labels database files at the earliest opportunity so that customers can update their own systems in time for 1 April 2025.  As we stated in our consultation document, we anticipate that test database files will be available from Autumn 2024 to allow for testing to take place. Customers should test the files in a sandbox test environment and not a live system.  We will endeavour to provide the actual files which reflect the SSC changes (and any business-as-usual changes we have made to the sortation data through the year) at the earliest opportunity.

Grace period

We encourage customers to make the transition to the new Access Selection Files as close to 1 April 2025 as possible to minimise impact. Please ensure you manage any pre-prepared mailings or delayed release mailings (i.e. pre-prepared mailings posted over a period) so they are sorted to the correct Access Selection Files for the time they will be handed over to Royal Mail Wholesale. However, to assist with the transition to the new Access Selection File database we will allow for customers to commence sorting their mail against the new Access Selection File two weeks prior to 1 April 2025, and to continue sorting their mail against the existing Access Selection File database for 2 weeks after 1 April 2025.

Request for an additional SSC failure allowance for NPP1

Some customers also fed back that, in relation to the National Spread Benchmark measure for NPP1 customers, as another SSC is being added in Scotland, Royal Mail should offer an extra allowed SSC failure for Scotland and Northern Ireland (i.e. we currently allow one SSC failure as a permitted variance, which is 20% of the SSCs within the region, and we should allow two SSC failures from 1 April 2025).  We do not agree to this as it would constitute a disproportionate increase to the number of allowed failures for the region.

Change from 48-way to 49-way sortation

To effect the change from 48 SSCs to 49 SSCs in respect of what is currently 48-way sortation, we are amending the Access Letters Contract and the Access User Guide, as detailed in the Contract Change Notice and User Guide Amendment Notice.