Postcomm Grants Hays Licence

Hays PLC
17 September 2001


HAYS GRANTED LICENCE BY POSTCOMM

Hays very much welcomes the decision by Postcomm to grant us the first
licence under the Postal Services Act 2000 to introduce a wider range of
services for business customers, incorporating new and innovative
developments.

Hays DX has provided a range of specialist business mail services for more
than a quarter of a century.  This licence will enable us to extend these
services to all categories of mail for our customers, including for the first
time mail which has previously fallen within Royal Mail's letter monopoly.

Over the twelve month duration of this initial licence we intend to
progressively introduce for our customers a range of new and innovative
features and options using the very latest in postal technology.

We see our specialist business-to-business mail services, with early morning
deliveries, tailored and later collection facilities, high reliability,
simplified charging structures and extensive customer care arrangements as
complementing the more general postal service offered by Consignia rather
than competing directly with it.  We are confident that this licence will
enable us to begin the process of revitalising and expanding the mail market,
and poses no risk to the universal service provided by Consignia.

The progressive introduction of competition will benefit users of postal
services and postal operators alike, and Hays are delighted to have been
given the opportunity to be at the forefront of this new era for postal
services in the United Kingdom.



For further information, please contact:

Bob Lawson          Chairman, Hays plc                 01483 302 203
Neil McLachlan      Group Finance Director, Hays plc   01483 302 203

Jon Coles           Brunswick                          020 7404 5959

Notes for Editors


Hays DX applied for licences under Postcomm's interim licensing regime on 30
April this year.  The licence issued today by Postcomm following a detailed
and thorough examination of our application, and a statutory process of
public consultation with a wide range of interested parties, enables us to
provide:

* Collection, streaming and consolidation of mail from customers of our
existing document exchange (DX) service.  Under the new licence we will be
able for the first time to collect all a DX customer's mail, to stream it
through our automated machines into the most cost and service-effective
networks, thereby both reducing costs and improving service for our
customers.  Beyond that we will also have the facility to combine the mail
which we cannot handle through our own systems from a number of customers to
create sufficient volumes to access the Royal Mail pre-sort discounts which
at present are available only to large single users, and to do this without
any loss of service by utilising the wider access arrangements to the Royal
Mail infrastructure provided for under the terms of Consignia's licence.

* A pre-8.00am delivery to the door service for customers of our existing
document exchange service sending letters to businesses addresses in the
London EC and WC, Edinburgh EH1 and EH2 and Manchester M1-M5 and M60 postal
districts, and

* Additional (advanced) services to customers of our Mailine service in the
insurance, travel, opticians, licensed betting and retail financial services
industries (the Mailine service provides a highly reliable overnight service
with early morning delivery to high street business addresses within these
sectors).  The new licence will enable us for the first time to handle all
mail, including that costing less than £1 and weighing less than 350 grams,
for our Mailine customers, and to do so in a system which over the 12 month
period of this interim licence would be progressively upgraded with a series
of advanced features and options.

The licence will run for a period of 12 months in the first instance.