But it is not the first time the Royal Mail has provided a bizarre reason for disrupting deliveries.

If it snows, it might disrupt deliveries.

Absence and lateness has attracted research as they disrupt organizational production, deliveries and services.

Federal District Judge Pierre N. Leval ruled Monday night that the deliverers' union was in contempt of court for disrupting deliveries and ordered fines of $100,000 for every hour the daily paper was delayed.

The company has ironed out the kinks in its automated distribution center in Kentucky, for instance; those problems had disrupted deliveries, angered retailers and led to a buildup of inventory.

Florists and candy and card shops were expecting a brisk Valentine's Day business today, though the floral industry was hit hard by the snowstorm, which disrupted deliveries for one of the biggest sale days of the year.

Ferry services connecting small island communities are virtually paralyzed, disrupting deliveries of food and other supplies.

He said success in sharply reducing coca cultivation in Peru and Bolivia by disrupting deliveries to Colombia had changed Colombia from a nation that largely processed and transported cocaine to the leading grower of raw coca.

If anything, management anticipated that the strikers would focus their efforts on disrupting wholesale deliveries by truck, not retail sales at newsstands, candy stores, groceries and the like.

Anxiety over whether the Enron investigation would disrupt deliveries or have other market repercussions led to an increase in prices.