ROYAL Mail officials have agreed at last that they WILL attend next Friday's crucial meeting in York called by business bosses suffering from late deliveries.

Andy Lamb, area general manager for mid-Yorkshire covering York will be at the meeting, at York's Mansion House, to answer the growing clamour for an early delivery.

Also at the meeting will be a representative from the Yorkshire CBI, anxious to understand the difficulties which could face the region and eventually the nation, as Royal Mail ploughs ahead with its cost-cutting scheme to reduce two deliveries to one

Businesses of all kinds in Greater York have been outraged at the disruption. Bank managers, lawyers, accountants, financial advisers, and organisations which rely heavily on mail order are among the many firms in York protesting against huge staff disruption caused by the post not arriving until as late as 1pm.

By the time staff have processed the mail, much valuable production time has been lost - and work even delayed until the following day, they say. Many firms reject the Royal Mail suggestion that they can pick up their mail free from York's Leeman Road sorting office at 8.30am, or that they can pay £2,600 per year for a special early delivery.

Smaller firms, particularly those without transport, say they cannot afford the time to send a member of staff to Leeman Road.

Royal Mail has been "giving consideration" to an invitation to the meeting, but now Mr Lamb has agreed to attend, flanked by a member of his media relations team.

Mr Lamb is expected to tell his audience that the new system and complaints were being monitored and after consulting staff, modifications were being made, the good consequences of which had yet to filter through.

Next week's meeting has already received the backing of York MP Hugh Bayley, the 750-member York and North Yorkshire Chamber of Commerce and joint organiser of the meeting, Adam Sinclair, chairman of the Chamber of Trade and owner of Mulberry Hall glassware shop in Stonegate.

Now Andrew Palmer, deputy regional director of Yorkshire and the Humber CBI has stressed the importance of the get-together. "York and the rest of the region could find themselves at a disadvantage to the rest of Britain.

"If this rolls out across the country we at the CBI want to see the shape of things to come as they have occurred in York."

Some views from York businesses:

"The late delivery of post means later banking.

"We are all trying to get to our local banks in the afternoon now, often when school traffic is around again, and when banks are at their busiest.

"This means traffic congestion in the areas of banks, thus further upsetting local residents, and causing frustration by drivers attempting to find legal spaces."

- Carol Donnelly, Accounts Manager of Glass Supplies, in Thief Lane, York

"We arrange our staffing to deal with incoming mail promptly in the mornings.

"Late delivery makes it very difficult for us and indeed is proving costly in terms of staffing."

- James Finlay, of the Company of Merchant Adventurers of the city of York

"When you think how expensive first class post is, people must have a better service.

"On Wednesday we didn't get the post until 2.15pm and we had £27,000 of cheques, which were too late to pay into the bank."

- Andy Curry, of Glen Garage, Heworth

Updated: 11:54 Friday, February 06, 2004