Royal Mail

Royal Mail Group Limited, trading as Royal Mail, is a British postal service and courier company, originally established in 1516 as a government department. It is owned by International Distributions Services. It operates the brands Royal Mail (letters and parcels) and Parcelforce Worldwide (parcels). The group used the name Consignia for a brief period in the early 2000s. The company provides mail collection and delivery services throughout the UK. Letters and parcels are deposited in post or parcel boxes, or are collected in bulk from businesses and transported to Royal Mail sorting offices. Royal Mail owns and maintains the UK's distinctive red pillar boxes, first introduced in 1852 (12 years after the first postage stamp, Penny Black), and other post boxes, many of which bear the royal cypher of the reigning monarch at the date of manufacture. Deliveries are made at least once every day except Sundays and bank holidays at uniform charges for all UK destinations. Royal Mail generally aims to make first class deliveries the next business day throughout the nation. For most of its history, the Royal Mail was a public service, operating as a government department or public corporation. Following the Postal Services Act 2011, a majority of the shares in Royal Mail were floated on the London Stock Exchange in 2013. The UK government initially retained a 30% stake in Royal Mail, but sold its remaining shares in 2015, ending 499 years of state ownership. During its Annual General Meeting on 20 July 2022, the company announced that the holding company responsible for both Royal Mail and GLS would change its name to International Distributions Services. General Post Office The Royal Mail can trace its history back to 1516, when Henry VIII established a "Master of the Posts", a position that was renamed "Postmaster General" in 1710. Upon his accession to the throne of England at the Union of the Crowns in 1603, James VI moved his court to London.