Ah! That makes perfect sense when you think about the redo overhead! I am not sure why we have the DB in standby mode. We do not report on it and you're right, with a restore period so small, it is pointless.

I have changed the database to be in restore mode and would you believe it, each backup file is taking about 40 seconds to restore now! Unbelievable!! Talk about an overhead. From 10 to 20 minutes a file down to less than a minute!

Thanks all for your help. Definitely learnt something today!