Free parcel service to frontline troops in Iraq and Afghanistan

Royal Mail’s free parcel service to frontline troops in Iraq and Afghanistan will be available from the UK’s 14,200 Post Office branches from Monday 3 September.

The service is open to friends and relatives to send gifts and home comforts up to a maximum weight of two kilograms to named individuals at a range of military bases and supporting units in the Afghanistan and Iraq operating area.

From 3 September, parcels carrying the qualifying British Forces Post Office number and addressed to individual service personnel can be posted free of charge at any of the nationwide chain of Post Office branches.

Royal Mail will pay the postage charge which would have applied to cover the delivery of parcels to the BFPO base at Mill Hill in north London. The BFPO will then provide logistics expertise to transport the parcels as swiftly as possible to the frontline.

The BFPO also confirmed today that its traditional free Christmas service for parcels to operational units overseas would again run this year from Thursday 9 November to Friday 7 December, the last recommended posting date for parcels sent via the free service to arrive in time for Christmas. The BFPO, part of the Ministry of Defence, will again pay for this Christmas service.

Allan Leighton, Royal Mail’s Chairman, said: “Royal Mail is very proud to support frontline servicemen and women by making it as easy as possible for their loved ones to keep in touch with them.”

Brigadier Mike Hickson, Director of BFPO, said: “I’d like to thank Royal Mail for its extremely generous offer to provide a free mail service to the families and friends of those serving in Afghanistan and Iraq. BFPO is pleased to be able to maintain the strong links between our two organisations and we are looking forward to working with Royal Mail to introduce the free service on 3 September.”