What a week it was with the postal strike on. I am not going into any details if the demands of the Royal Mail postal employees are valid or not. But what the union leaders out there don’t know is how much of an impact this causes to the people out there (which might include the families of the striking employees too). The employees of the CMU union constitute a whopping 2/3rd of the Royal mail work force i am told. So the strike in turn puts additional load on the other 1/3rd of their colleagues.

The strike though against the management of Royal mail affects people no where in their Radar. There are so many people out there relying on their monthly pension cheques. Appointments with the GPs and PCTs for critical tests are affected, as the appointment letter is not going to come on time. The Prescriptions posted to elderly are gonna be lying in the mail center. These are the people who are going to affect not necessarily the Royal Mail bosses or the government. A day of token strike is understandable. But a series of strikes concurrently is atrocious.

Now, the big question. How has the strike helped the workers? In the end, they have lost a few days’ pay. They now have a large backlog that they need to clear once they resume work. Royal mail has lost millions in revenue, which is going to affect the bottom-line making the job cuts all the more inevitable. Now that its hit hard on the face, small businesses are going to seek alternative mailing routes there by causing more danger to the postal workers.

Moreover, people have started considering the electronic options all the more as there is no strikes to fear and its cheaper.