Up to 500,000 pieces of mail destined for Ireland were stranded in London yesterday, according to a statement issued by An Post.
The mail should have been dispatched to Ireland "at least some days ago or longer" but it was never sent, the postal company statement said. An Post said it received a phone call yesterday afternoon from the Royal Mail informing it that, due to an operational error, post for Ireland had been inadvertently held in a London depot for some days. They were told that the Royal Mail was attempting to make the necessary arrangements to have the mail transported to Ireland as a matter of urgency. The delayed post represents several days worth of incoming British mail, An Post said. However, Patrick O'Neill, spokesman for the Royal Mail, denied there was any problem at the London depot or with mail deliveries to Ireland.
"That is just not true," he said. "There have been no operational errors leading to mail being held up in a London depot. We will be making every effort to ensure that even mail posted after the last posting day will reach Ireland before Christmas."
Anna McHugh, spokeswoman for An Post, said last night that the company stood over its statement. "We are doing all we can to glean more information from the Royal Mail as to how they made such a blunder," she said.
"But we stand over the fact that they made it. This is really most unsatisfactory at such a busy time. We don't know if it is just standard letters or bulkier letters, though we understand it does not include parcels. We are very annoyed about this." She said the receipt of mail from Britain in recent days was much lower than expected.
"If they can get the mail to us overnight, we'll work flat out to get it delivered by Christmas Eve, otherwise it will be December 29th at the earliest," she said.
