You can rely on Swiss Post – at least most of the time. More than 80 percent of letters reach the recipient the very next working day, and this is what German postal law has so far required. But things are moving, because the law is about to be amended. And the previous 80 percent rule could also fall. The existing requirements for very fast letter delivery could be relaxed, in return, postal companies must ensure that the letters actually arrive.
At least that’s what the key points for the amendment that the Federal Ministry of Economics presented on Thursday provide. According to this, the previous delivery time specification for letters is “hardly helpful”. After all, the sender can never be sure whether his letter will arrive the next day or whether it belongs to the remaining 20 percent. A longer term could replace this “E plus 1” requirement, but with greater binding force. For example, the rule that more than 95 percent of letters are delivered within three working days. This is to be flanked by stronger sanction options by the Federal Network Agency. She had recently registered an increasing number of complaints about late letters. And Swiss Post itself would also like to get rid of the tiresome one-day rule. If it were up to her, letters would no longer necessarily be delivered on Mondays either. However, there is nothing about this in the key points.
Instead, it should be easier for competitors to enter the mail market, for example through simplified procedures. Consignments of goods from postal competitors should also be able to be transported via their network. Regulation, including postage, is to become stricter. At the same time, the letter should become more climate-friendly and sustainable overall. In this way, customers should find out what CO₂ footprint the various postal service providers leave behind. And so that, for example in cities, falls, it should be easier for companies to cooperate with each other. In this way, a deliverer could distribute letters from different postal service providers on the “last mile”. That would relieve the inner cities, and the letter companies too. After all, in times of digitization “a further decline in shipments can be expected,” according to the key points. Each individual letter becomes more expensive.
Delivery is currently completely halted: in the collective bargaining dispute at Deutsche Post, thousands of postmen, parcel carriers and other employees have again stopped work to emphasize their demand for 15 percent more wages. The Verdi union spoke of 6,000 participants in the warning strikes on Thursday, the Deutsche Post of 3,100. As with the warning strikes last week, the participation rate at the affected post locations was around a third, according to company information. This time, Verdi struck fewer postal sites than last week, so the number of warning strike participants was lower.
According to the company, around 450,000 packages were left behind nationwide as a result of the outstanding deliveries, which was almost seven percent of the average daily amount. The rate for letters was 3.5 percent, i.e. 1.7 million. These shipments should be delivered by the beginning of next week at the latest – the exact time of delivery also depends on whether further work stoppages follow and the required sorting and delivery centers are affected. During the two-and-a-half-day warning strikes last week, a million packages and three million letters were left behind, and around 30,000 employees stopped work.