UK's Royal Mail fined again for delivery delays

Britain's postal operator Royal Mail was fined for mail delivery delays for a third year in a row, the country's communications regulator Ofcom said Wednesday.

The £21-million ($28-million) fine, double last year's penalty, comes as the UK's struggling postal service has failed to sufficiently improve its performance.

Royal Mail was taken over by Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky's EP Group this year, bringing the 500-year-old postal service under foreign ownership for the first time.

"Millions of important letters are arriving late, and people aren't getting what they pay for," said Ian Strawhorne, Ofcom's director of enforcement.

He added that Royal Mail must make "significant improvements, not more empty promises."

The regulator warned that a failure to meet delivery targets would result in more fines.

The company recently returned to operating profit as cost-cutting measures were implemented including voluntary redundancies and fewer deliveries for certain non-priority letters.

"We will continue to work hard to deliver further sustained improvements to our quality of service," Royal Mail said in a statement.