Easy to do: If you want to quickly go to one of the 16 Postbank branches in Munich these days to receive a registered letter or to pick up or send a package, you may find yourself standing in front of locked doors. This has happened to many customers in the past few weeks and is also confirmed by Postbank, for example for the Postbank branch on Meistersingerstrasse. According to press spokesman Oliver Rittmaier from the Postbank headquarters in Bonn, this has been “available to our customers consistently throughout the year with regular opening hours.” “It was only open to a limited extent on a few days, usually for a few hours.”
The problems were apparently somewhat greater in the Postbank branch on Gotthardstrasse in Laim. This was recently “only open to a limited extent or temporarily closed due to staff shortages caused by sick employees”. The situation there has now eased again. Rittmaier says they are now planning to reopen the branch “as normal,” adding that there were “no particular abnormalities” in this branch this year.
Postbank does not cite the massive IT problems since the takeover by Deutsche Bank as the reason for the temporary closures. The main reason is usually “staff absences due to sick employees”, as personnel planning cannot always respond to this through so-called stand-ins or substitutes from other branches. However, Postbank is required to always ensure the “four-eyes principle” for security reasons for customers and staff. This applies to both the checkout areas and parcel storage. In any case, those responsible and the staff of the branch teams are “doing everything they can with a bundle of measures to enable stable operation of the branches.” This means that the self-service devices are also available when the branch is closed.
It was precisely in this already tense situation that Deutsche Bank announced that almost half of the remaining Postbank branches would be closed. Of the current 550 locations nationwide, a total of 200 would be closed in the next two and a half years, announced Claudio de Sanctis, who is responsible for the group’s private customer business. This measure affects Postbank customers on the one hand, but also those who have previously been able to buy stamps, pick up or send registered mail or parcels at such a branch.
Deutsche Post itself, which gave up its last branches about a dozen years ago and recently also gave up its name (it is now part of the DHL Group), relies on several partners to offer its services. In Munich these are around 130 so-called partner branches, 160 parcel shops and around 200 packing stations, as press spokesman Dieter Nawrath from the DHL Group’s Regional Communications South calculates.
The legislature has made it a requirement that the post office must operate a stationary post office in independent communities with more than 2,000 residents and also in districts with more than 2,000 residents. In larger, contiguous built-up areas, it must be ensured that a branch can be reached at a distance of a maximum of two kilometers. Nawrath: “Of course we also adhere to these guidelines in Munich.” We are also constantly working on “further improving our services and offers”.
It was possible to further expand the service network. The number of Postbank branches with postal services across Bavaria fell from 149 in 2007 to 104 last year. This was more than offset by the increased number of partner branches. In 2007 there were 2,064 of them, now (as of 2022) the number is 2,159. According to Nawrath, this is associated with “noticeable service improvements for customers”, above all a significant increase in opening times from an average of 18 hours per week in 1990 today 55 hours per week.
Deutsche Post will therefore continue its cooperation with partners from the retail sector, such as stationery stores, grocers and petrol stations. Over the past 20 years, the number of sales outlets and parcel collection points has more than doubled. The annual customer monitor, the largest private customer study in Germany, confirmed “that over 94 percent of customers are satisfied with partner retail branches.”