The dispute over Royal Mail's access prices pits a loss-making network against the customers who depend on it. Both sides are making an honest case, and the lasting answer lies elsewhere.
In July, Royal Mail told its wholesale customers that access prices would rise from 5 October by an average of around a quarter, with some business mail products rising by roughly a third.
It followed an increase of about nine per cent in January. For the organisations that collect, sort, and hand bulk mail to Royal Mail for final delivery, and for the banks, insurers, utilities, and NHS trusts they serve, that is a steep ask inside a single year.
The Mail Competition Forum, on behalf of 17 access customers, referred the increase to Ofcom. On 4 September Ofcom accepted the dispute, and under Royal Mail's own contract terms the rises are suspended while it decides whether they are fair and reasonable. A determination is expected within four months.
It is tempting to pick a side. I would caution against it, because both parties are making an honest case.
Royal Mail's Bind
Royal Mail is not raising prices out of opportunism.
Its letters business has lost close to £800m over four years, by its own figures, while letter volumes continue their long structural decline.
The universal service still requires it to reach every one of the UK's 32 million addresses at a uniform price, and the cost of that network does not fall as neatly as the post it carries.
Access customers have long paid rates below equivalent consumer prices. Seen from Royal Mail's side, the notification it issued (CCN 129) is an overdue step towards a financially sustainable service, and Ofcom has itself repeatedly named that sustainability as a priority.
The Customers' Squeeze
The customers' case is just as real.
A rise of this size, compounding on January's, lands on organisations already working to tight margins, and it is ultimately passed to the end customer opening a statement or a regulated notice.
It arrives, too, against a backdrop of service performance that has frequently fallen short. Ofcom has fined Royal Mail more than £37m in recent years for missed delivery targets, and the regulator has not been oblique about it.
"Royal Mail's current performance is not acceptable. For several years, too many deliveries have been delayed, and this has had a serious impact on families, communities and businesses across all the nations and regions of the UK."
Ofcom, statement on the Business and Trade Committee's report, May 2026
Access operators are not resisting a fair price for a good service. They are questioning a steep price against an uncertain one. That is a legitimate question, and it is the one Ofcom has agreed to weigh.
What Ofcom Can, And Cannot, Settle
Here it helps to be precise about what the dispute will resolve.
Ofcom does not directly regulate the prices Royal Mail charges access operators, and there is no absolute cap on them. Its principal safeguard is a margin squeeze control, meant to keep the gap between access and retail prices consistent with fair competition, rather than a ceiling on the increase itself.
The question before Ofcom is narrower than the headlines suggest. Because there is no cap to revert to, an outright strike-down is the least likely outcome. The realistic range runs from the increases being upheld, to a partial reduction, to a requirement that Royal Mail justify them more fully.
What Ofcom Is Actually Deciding
Whether the price changes notified in CCN 129 are fair and reasonable terms, conditions, and charges under access conditions USPA 3.1A and 3.1B. A decision is expected within four months of 4 September 2026.
Whatever lands, the immediate effect for customers is the one already in force. The rise is paused.
But even a favourable determination would treat a symptom. It might move the number. It cannot change the arithmetic beneath it, fewer letters carrying a larger share of a fixed network's cost.
That pressure returns next year, and the year after.
The Direction Both Sides Are Already Travelling
Which is why the more important shift is happening away from the negotiating table. The country has been moving to digital for years, and the regulator has now marked the path.
In Policy Statement PS25/13, the FCA amended its definition of a durable medium so that, for the retail disclosures in scope, electronic communication became the default from 12 January 2026, with paper available on request rather than as the starting point. It is a contained rule with a broad signal, and we have set out what it asks of firms in our durable medium guide.
For the disclosures in scope, paper is now the option that has to be justified.
For the highest-volume, most sensitive communications, statements, regulated correspondence, the notices people genuinely need to keep, that changes the calculation.
A statement delivered through a secure digital channel can be built to meet the standard the FCA sets for a durable medium: personally addressed, storable, and reproducible unchanged, with delivery and access that can be evidenced rather than assumed.
The commercial case moves in the same direction. On our own modelling with Project Rome, businesses with high mail volumes can save up to 95% on print, pack, and post by switching to secure email, and the message reaches the customer in minutes rather than days.
Paying More To Post What Could Be Sent Securely?
Learn how Mailock helps high-volume senders move statements and regulated correspondence out of print and post without losing the delivery record.
See the cost-to-serve case
This is the work Mailock was built for, and it is why comms outsourcers such as Paragon work with us: to move their clients' most important communications into a channel that is secure, compliant, and measurably cheaper, without asking the recipient to give up the record they are entitled to. Every statement that makes that move is one fewer item over which the price of a stamp has to be fought.
"The firms we work with are not waiting for the determination. They are going through their communications and asking which ones genuinely have to be paper, and moving the rest to a channel where access and delivery can be evidenced."
Adam Byford, COO, Beyond Encryption (Mailock)
That is the quiet resolution to a noisy dispute. Royal Mail needs fewer loss-making letters as much as its customers need lower bills, and the digital transition serves both.
The Ofcom decision matters, and it will set the terms for the next round. But the round after that will be won by whoever has already moved the mail that never needed to be paper.
FAQs
When Will Ofcom Decide On Royal Mail's Access Price Rises?
Ofcom accepted the dispute on 4 September 2026 and intends to issue its decision within four months, in line with its dispute resolution guidelines.
Are Royal Mail's October Access Price Increases Still Going Ahead?
No. Under the terms of Royal Mail's own contracts, the increases notified for 5 October are suspended while Ofcom resolves the dispute.
What Is CCN 129?
CCN 129 is the contract change notice Royal Mail issued on 23 July 2026 setting out the access price increases. Ofcom is deciding whether it constitutes fair and reasonable terms, conditions and charges under access conditions USPA 3.1A and 3.1B.
What Does The FCA's Durable Medium Change Mean For Post?
From 12 January 2026, for the retail disclosures in scope of PS25/13, electronic communication is the default and paper is provided on request. It does not ban paper, but it removes the assumption that paper is the starting point.
References
Ofcom accepts dispute regarding Royal Mail's wholesale price rises, Ofcom, 2026
Dispute between Mail Competition Forum and Royal Mail concerning notified price rises for access services, Ofcom, 2026
Statement on the Business and Trade Committee's report on the regulation of postal services, Ofcom, 2026
PS25/13: The MiFID Organisational Regulation, Financial Conduct Authority, 2025
Reviewed by
Sam Kendall, 14.09.26
Paul Holland
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