BBC News - Today - Royal Mail profits surge Royal Mail is expected to report a surge in half-year profits paving the way for a long-awaited privatisation of the company. The postal operator is benefiting from a boom in parcel deliveries which is helping to make up for the steady decline in its letter deliveries business. Amazon is now Royal Mail's biggest client and the postal operator said last month it is hiring 1,000 extra staff to help meet demand for online deliveries. Steve Hannon, a former operations director at Royal Mail and now chief executive of Postal and Logistics Consulting Worldwide, explained to Today business presenter Simon Jack that while "letter mail has actually declined by 25% since its peak in 2005," Royal Mail has become a lot more efficient while preserving strong industrial relations.