POSTAL NEWS
No 75-2020
Formulated by UNI AproPost and Logistics Sector
1. The new UPS store: too little, too late?September 17, 2020.2. Australia Post Executive Manager addresses parcel delays and Christmas delivery.September 16, 2020.3. Iceland Post (Pósturinn) expands parcel locker network. September 15, 2020.4. Warning strikes at Deutsche Post AG: More than 11,000 strikers at over 300 locations. September 12, 2020. 5. SingPost to trial smart letterbox system as e-commerce surges.September 11, 2020. |
1. The new UPS store: too little, too late?
September 17, 2020
The UPS Store has unveiled a new look and modern store design - but is it too little, too late?
This is the first major change to the UPS Store’s layout in 20 years, with brighter colour and lighting as well as more digital elements.
The UPS Store lags many years behind postal operators in other markets when it comes to store layout. The new design is the result of four years of testing store layouts across the USA.
The UPS Store network is operated by franchisees at over 5,000 sites across North America, and offers services including shipping, mail and package receiving, printing, scanning, and faxing.
The new design will be standard for new franchise owners.
Key elements of the new design
Lockers - Yes, the new stores include an option for parcel lockers. If included, the lockers will be near the front entrance, with 24/7 accessibility. Will franchisees be paid a fee to load and manage the lockers? Or will a UPS driver do the loading and unloading?
Round the clock services - A security gate will close off other sectors outside of operating hours, leaving an area at the front of the store for 24-hour services such as mailboxes, self-serve printers, and of course parcel lockers.
Colour scheme - UPS has cast off the monochromatic colour palette of the previous generation of stores in favour of brighter colours. (Reminder: four years of testing!)
Digital signage - Digital “menu boards” will be visible around the store. A bit like your local coffee shop. Or buses.
Parcel delivery, collection and returns
One of UPS Stores’ key services is packaging and shipping. The new layout does seem to emphasise those strengths - and this is relevant to the stores’ PUDO functions.
The UPS Store network is a key part of UPS’s PUDO network - and plays a major role in Amazon returns. (Until Amazon has built out its Amazon Counter network…) As delivery and packaging professionals, will UPS Store franchisees take better care of customers’ parcels than third-party PUDO partners?
Furthermore, the UPS Store can offer value-added services like inspections of product returns.
The store layout has to make it simple for customers who are dropping off parcels, collecting parcels, or returning e-commerce purchases. And for this to work, it’s not just about the store layout - the in-store counter technology has to be first-rate.
So far, so good … so what?
Let’s be blunt here. Many posts have already modernised their post office networks, and are trying to hone their focus on the customer. Fast transactions, easy drop-off of e-commerce returns, and 24-hour self service sections are the hallmarks of these renewed post office networks.
The one thing in UPS’s favour here is that the US Postal Service has been slow to revitalise its own post office network. The USPS, with its unrivalled retail and delivery network, is in desperate need of renewal.
As for parcel lockers, let’s see if UPS Store franchisees embrace the concept. The key will be how UPS itself sells the parcel locker value proposition. Lockers should help drive foot traffic to UPS Stores, but franchisees might see the lockers as a threat to their revenue-generating mailboxes.
Source : http://www.thepostalhub.com/blog
2. Australia Post Executive Manager addresses parcel delays and Christmas delivery
September 16, 2020
Online shopping has boomed by 70 per cent during the pandemic - so much so, Australia Post parcel deliveries have been up almost 200 per cent some days compared to last year.
But as we wait for the postie to bring our goodies to our doors, many of us have been faced with delays.
Some parcels are even clocking up the kilometres, making epic journeys around the country before landing in our letterboxes.
And with Christmas just a matter of weeks away, Australia Post Executive Manager of Business, Government and International Gary Starr has one critical piece of advice: “Plan, and plan early.”
“It’s weeks away to those Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales in November that then leads into Christmas,” Starr said.
“We will be publishing Christmas cut-off dates in the next week - both to our retailers and merchants and clearly to the public.
“(The cut-off) will be late November to early December.
“What I do expect is that during that cyber sale period from mid-November into early December will be the main Christmas shopping period this year.
“I urge people to plan and plan early. Who knows Christmas will bring. Last Christmas brought the bushfires and floods and we were just coming off our busiest period and then the pandemic hit.
“We have planned as much as we can with our customers - and they are also struggling with bringing in inventory and merchandise to sell.
“Planning is the bottom line.”
Massive volumes
With COVID and the shift in consumer behaviours, Australia Post has experienced three to four years of growth in the past five months.
“We are using more and more vans to deliver parcels because they can carry 50 times more volume, and with that growth, we’re moving fast to do that,” Starr said.
“Here in Victoria, in August, we saw a growth of 170 per cent year-on-year in volume and 85 per cent around the country.
“There are many days where we are delivering over 2 million parcels a day.
“That’s a huge number across a country as vast as Australia.
“And there are parcels going and coming in from overseas that we are working with our postal partners to get them to people’s homes as quickly as possible.
“They are massive volumes on a daily basis, and it’s not really abated since March.”
The issue of delays
When you’re dealing with such volumes, there will inevitably be hiccups - with reports of some parcels taking three to four weeks to be delivered.
“There absolutely are delays,” Starr said.
“We are living in a time where we’re working with 33 per cent less in our facilities in Melbourne in Stage 4 - that makes it very challenging.
“We’re picking the fastest route we can to get things to customers.
“We formally communicated that we saw an extra three to four-day delay in our standard parcel product.
“There is the odd parcel that does take longer than that.
“We’re asking people to be patient, download the MyPost app and check-in to our website, and give it a few days and then call our contact centre or connect with us through digital channels to find out what your parcel is.
“We’re working around the clock, literally, seven days a week, 24 hours, with limited capacity in Victoria and social distancing around the rest of the country to get parcels there as quickly as we can.
“But the reality is there will be delays.”
Source : https://7news.com.au/the-morning-show
3. Iceland Post (Pósturinn) expands parcel locker network
September 15, 2020
Pósturinn (Iceland Post) has started expanding its parcel locker network, from eight to almost 40.
The parcel lockers, called Póstbox, are currently all located in the Reykjavík area. The thirty new lockers will be installed around the country.
Of the eight lockers currently deployed, all bar one are accessible 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The remaining locker bank is located in a shopping centre, and is open from 7am to 11pm weekdays and 11am to 11pm on weekends.
Customers are sent an SMS notification and an e-mail with a QR code and PIN when their parcel is ready for collection. To collect, the customer scans the QR code or enters a phone number and PIN.
The maximum weight for parcels delivered to Póstbox lockers is 20kg. There are three compartment sizes:
· Small: 8 x 38 x 64 cm
· Medium: 19 x 38 x 64 cm
· Large: 41 x 38 x 64 cm
Customers must sign up for Iceland Post’s Minn Póstur app to be able to use the lockers as a delivery address.
Source : http://www.thepostalhub.com/blog
4. Warning strikes at Deutsche Post AG: More than 11,000 strikers at over 300 locations
September 12, 2020
In the wage dispute with Deutsche Post AG, the United Service Union (ver.di) has increased the pressure on the employer with its warning strikes that have been taking place since Wednesday (9.9.20). This Saturday alone (September 12th, 2020) around 4,900 employees took part in the warning strikes at various locations in 14 federal states by the afternoon. To date, a total of more than 11,000 employees at over 300 locations throughout Germany have participated in the warning strike measures.
"This is a clear sign from our members in the direction of employers," said Andrea Kocsis, vice chairman of ver.di and negotiator in the collective bargaining dispute with DP AG. “A 1.5 percent increase in salaries, as recently indicated by the employer, is not accepted by our members. They ensure excellent company figures every day and now make it clear that they deserve a decent wage increase in return. "
According to its own statements, the group confirms that it has been able to increase its profits significantly and that it is "emerging from the crisis stronger".
The Annual General Meeting recently resolved to distribute the dividend to the shareholders, unchanged from the previous year.
“Deutsche Post AG is doing well economically, that is obvious to everyone. We expect the employer to respond to our demand for a significant increase in wages for everyone of 5.5 percent in the coming round of negotiations, ”Kocsis continued.
The next collective bargaining meeting will be on 21./22. September 2020.
Source : https://www.verdi.de/presse/pressemitteilungen
5. SingPost to trial smart letterbox system as e-commerce surges
September 11, 2020
Singapore Post delivered a record volume of e-commerce packages over the circuit breaker period, as store closures forced consumers to shop online.
Together, the postal service and courier arm Speedpost handled three million e-commerce items in May, a 50 per cent increase over the same month last year, Mr Vincent Phang, SingPost's Singapore head and chief executive of postal services, told The Straits Times.
The reopening of bricks-and-mortar stores has not led to a significant drop in deliveries, indicating a permanent shift in consumer behaviour that is accelerating the growth of e-commerce in Singapore, he said in an interview.
The Covid-19 pandemic has thus made the need to revamp the postal infrastructure more urgent, he said.
To kick-start this effort, SingPost will be conducting a public trial of its smart letterbox system in the coming months.
Instead of individual letterboxes, this system entails a central machine that stores and dispenses mail and small packages.
Items are sorted according to size for more space efficiency, and can be retrieved through a touch screen on the machine by providing a form of authentication, such as scanning a QR code.
Users may also receive a notification through a mobile app when items arrive.
The trial will start with one neighbourhood in the west and test the feasibility of replacing letterbox nests in the long run, Mr Phang said, adding that more details will be announced later.
A prototype was unveiled last year, along with smart stamps that can allow basic mail items to be tracked, which will be trialled later.
It is an opportune time to test the smart letterbox system as demand for contactless deliveries has increased, Mr Phang noted.
"And with the Covid-19 situation, we think maybe using a smartphone to scan QR codes is quite a normal thing these days," he added.
Postal systems worldwide have been grappling with a decline in traditional mail and surge in larger-sized e-commerce items even before the pandemic.
Many online purchases are sent through the mail, which is generally cheaper than courier services.
But when items cannot fit into a letterbox, the postman must make a doorstep delivery.
In high-rise Singapore, that takes an average of six minutes, versus six seconds for a letterbox delivery, Mr Phang said.
"Given the labour-intensive nature of our work, if we don't have this infrastructure... there will be a lot more postmen involved and we have to think about how to sustain that," he said.
On whether SingPost's vision for the full roll-out of smart letterboxes would entail one machine per Housing Board block and how costly that would be, he said these are some of the questions that the pilot aims to shed light on.
"Is this a viable piece of infrastructure to get the majority of essentials delivered? Can it be the backbone of an urban logistics delivery system? And if not, then (roll it out) where it matters, by precincts and in a progressive manner. That's some of our thinking."
Not having personal letterbox units - and potentially having people walk further to the nearest smart letterbox to get their mail - will require some adjustment, he noted.
"Why do you want to have a letterbox downstairs? Because you don't know what's coming", which necessitates frequent checks, he said.
But if there were notifications for mail arrivals, this would reduce the number of overall trips to the letterbox, he suggested.
"It's not just about the technology, but also the adaptability and acceptance by the public."
Source : https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore
POSTAL NEWS
No 76-2020
Formulated by UNI AproPost and Logistics Sector
1. DPD opens new German depot. September 17, 2020.2. Amazon is rapidly adding planes to its air fleet, inching closer to UPS and FedEx. September 15, 2020.3. Swiss Post has released its new 4-year strategy for the 2021 to 2024 period. September 15, 2020.
5. La Poste announces changes with the sale of its telecoms branch. September 12, 2020. |
1. DPD opens new German depot
September 17, 2020
With courier operations continuing to boom, DPD has announced that its latest depot in Mannheim, Germany, has begun operations.
The company says that around 16,500 parcels per day will be processed there initially, however, on completion of a startup phase, it hopes the facility will be able to sort as many as 20,000 parcels a day. DPD notes that, if necessary, it will be possible for the center to process 3,500 additional parcels per day at peak times. The site’s sorting equipment was installed by Budde Fördertechnik, a long-standing partner to DPD, which says the machinery is equipped with extremely low-consumption, low-noise motors and drives.
Operations will be carried out by around 180 employees and DPD hopes the opening will provide significant relief for its depot in nearby Worms.
According to the company, the Worms depot had reached the limits of its capacity, and further expansion was no longer possible. At the same time no suitable site for a new building was available in the region. As a result, DPD acquired and refitted an existing building in Mannheim, to serve both that city and those of Heidelberg and Walldorf.
Depot manager Daniel Ay believes that the Mannheim location, apart from relieving the pressure on its existing facilities, also offers further advantages. “By moving to Mannheim we are crossing the Rhine, which is a natural border. Until now drivers had to cross the river every morning – with a limited number of road bridges. We now save a lot of time because we’re 35km and therefore about half an hour closer to the delivery area, which also cuts down on travel distances and COemissions.“
In addition, the depot is in an ideal location with the motorway just 10 minutes away and the city of Mannheim and the adjacent Rhine-Neckar region are easily accessible.”
This close proximity to various metropolitan regions also offers an opportunity for DPD to expand its electrically powered vehicle fleet. In summing up these advantages Ay stated, “We see enormous potential in terms of converting our vehicles to environmentally friendly delivery, which we are already implementing in the form of cargo bikes in Heidelberg, for example. But it’s not only the surrounding cities that are suitable for such a delivery service. Some peripheral areas are also potentially suitable for delivery by electronically operated vehicles.”
Source : https://www.parcelandpostaltechnologyinternational.com/news/operations
2. Amazon is rapidly adding planes to its air fleet, inching closer to UPS and FedEx
September 15, 2020
Key points:
· Between May and July, Amazon added nine planes to its air fleet, “the most it has added over a three-month span since its inception,” according to a recent study.
· Amazon’s air fleet plays a critical role in the company’s ability to ensure one- and two-day delivery.
· The company has grown its air cargo fleet to about 70 planes, up from a total of 50 last February.
The airline industry may be reeling from the coronavirus pandemic, but Amazon’s air cargo business has rapidly accelerated in recent months.
Between May and July, Amazon added nine planes to its Amazon Air fleet, “the most it has added over a three-month span since its inception,” said the report issued Thursday by DePaul University’s Chaddick Institute for Metropolitan Development.
“Amazon Air expanded rapidly during summer 2020, a period otherwise marked by sharp year-over-year declines in air-cargo traffic,” the report states.
Amazon Air now includes about 70 planes and the fleet is expected to grow to more than 80 by 2021, Amazon said in June. That’s up from the 50 planes it counted in February 2019.
Amazon’s air fleet, launched in 2016, is a critical part of its push to provide one- and two-day delivery. The company still relies on outside carriers for a significant share of its deliveries, but it has gradually moved more of its logistics operations in-house, allowing it to better control costs and delivery speeds. Analysts believe Amazon’s air fleet, combined with its massive network of airplanes, truck trailers and vans, could one day position it to rival UPS and FedEx.
The coronavirus pandemic has generated even more pressure on Amazon to ensure fast delivery, as it saw a surge in online orders from stuck-at-home shoppers who turned to the company for essential goods and groceries, along with other products like office supplies and electronics.
While its fleet has grown since May, Amazon Air still remains smaller than its rivals, including FedEx, which operates 463 planes, UPS’ fleet of 275 planes and DHL’s 77 planes, DePaul researchers said in a separate report published in May.
Amazon’s $1.5 billion air hub in northern Kentucky could help give it an edge, the report said. The hub, scheduled to open in 2021, is designed to have capacity for 100 Amazon-branded planes and handle an estimated 200 flights per day.
“The massive investment being made in a large hub at Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, however, could change everything,” the report said. “This hub appears to be the lynchpin to Amazon’s efforts to develop a comprehensive array of domestic delivery services across the United States.”
Source : https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/15
3. Swiss Post has released its new 4-year strategy for the 2021 to 2024 period
September 15, 2020
Aptly named “The Swiss Post of Tomorrow,” the strategy focuses on the continuous provision of first-class quality public service.
The strategy is meant to ensure the 170-year-old operator’s ongoing modernization. “‘The Swiss Post of Tomorrow’ is a growth strategy. However, we aim to achieve growth targeted to our traditional core competencies of logistics and communication. These are our strengths and this is where we can make the greatest contribution to Switzerland,” said Swiss Post CEO Roberto Cirillo in a statement about the strategy.
Switzerland’s postal service has been ranked top in the world for three years running according to the UPU’s Integrated Index for Postal Development (2IPD). Among 172 countries, Switzerland achieved standout results for the resilience and relevance of its network, with strong demand for its products and services, as well as a capacity to innovate, diversify its revenue streams, and develop sustainably.
Despite its achievements, the Post is working to increase its profits, which been declining for some years due to the rising gap between letter mail and parcel volumes and a low-interest environment. With the new strategy, the company hopes to generate profits to help self-fund the universal postal service across Switzerland and its other activities.
The strategy will have the company focus on guaranteeing the privacy of information in postal deliveries. Over its history, Swiss Post has safeguarded this principle in physical mail – now it will extend this focus to secure digital communication in areas where the sensitivity of data is essential, such as healthcare.
“A key raison d’être for Swiss Post is that we deliver information confidentially from sender to recipient... Swiss people’s awareness of the value of digital confidentiality and control over their own data will be much greater over the coming years than it is today,” explains Mr. Cirillo.
Over the next 4-year cycle, the company plans to maintain its network of nearly 800 post offices and open up to other service providers and authorities, providing additional access to their customers. Swiss Post offices would then become service centers, bringing in additional revenue, and familiarizing the public with new digital services. This vision of future post offices will also safeguard jobs for the company’s employees.
Swiss Post also intends to maintain its strong leadership position in public transport with its PostBus service. The company is looking to install terminals and digital access points on the road to meet Swiss customers’ growing demand for services enabling mobility. Sustainability will be a focus for developing these services, with the Post investing in alternative solutions such as electric vehicles.
“We are very aware of our responsibility to the environment and are striving to use fully carbon-neutral shipping solutions,” states Mr. Cirillo.
Swiss Post will implement the new strategy by first modernizing its organizational structure, focusing on securing jobs and hiring in areas where additional support is needed, such as IT and courier services. It will also organize training for letter carriers, raising the profile of the profession.
Describing his personal goal for the future of Swiss Post, Mr. Cirillo says, “Remaining relevant to the people of Switzerland is important to us. But that means keeping pace with them. We’ll have done a good job if people see Swiss Post as powering modern Switzerland.”
Source : https://www.upu.int/en/News/2020/9
4. Selling neighborhoods: is it common sense to absent subscribers?
The notion of quartermaster is historically one of the pillars of the organization of the postman's profession. It guarantees a relationship of trust with the population, it is one of the guarantees of the quality of public postal service, it provides the postman with stable working conditions through perfect knowledge of his route.
By using the pandemic as a pretext to freeze the sale of neighborhoods in March 2020, La Poste is playing against its camp, against distribution agents, and against its future interests (launch of new services). It weakens the confidence of the population, because this confidence starts with the daily link established with the postman!
FO Com has continued, through multiple interventions, to ask for the return of neighborhood sales. But La Poste persists and seems determined to do away with the notion of quartermaster, especially on Saturdays, while waiting for the rest ...
For FO Com, this is unacceptable and requires: 1 tour = 1 holder from Monday to Saturday .
Source : http://www.focom-laposte.fr/
5. La Poste announces changes with the sale of its telecoms branch
The Post is in talks to get rid of its telecoms branch and is considering selling its insurance business as its new CEO puts his mark on the centuries-old institution.
Sky News has learned that the government firm has appointed bankers to oversee and auction its telecommunications division, which has 500,000 customers and an annual turnover of around £ 150million.
City sources said on Friday that PJT Partners, the investment bank, had been hired to organize the auction, which is expected to cost more than £ 100million, following a number of expressions of interest unsolicited.
They added that a sale would only proceed if a satisfactory price was obtained.
Another firm in the city, Fenchurch Advisory Partners, has been appointed separately to conduct a strategic review of the Post’s insurance division.
The insurance industry is a regulated intermediary with approximately 300,000 clients, primarily in travel, home, automotive and protection products.
The prospective divestitures of both operations follow a comprehensive review of the company led by Nick Read, who joined La Poste as chief executive last year.
Mr Read’s appointment came amid a growing row over the multi-million pound scandal that resulted in a number of his deputy postmasters – or branch managers – being wrongly sent to prison.
The crisis led the Post to agree last December to pay nearly £ 58million to settle a lawsuit brought by a group of 550 deputy postmasters.
At the time, the network, which has around 11,500 branches across Britain, apologized, with Mr Read’s predecessor Paula Vennells the target of particularly fierce criticism over his handling of the problem.
In May, the Post launched a program to provide redress to current and former postmasters who were not part of the dispute resolution but who believe they have been harmed by earlier versions of the Horizon computer system.
The company is now committed to appointing for the first time one of its army of postmasters to its board of directors – a move that has been endorsed by UK Government Investments (UKGI), the agency that oversees the interest of taxpayers in it.
Those relations were strained by a scandal involving the use of a faulty computer system called Horizon, which has led some agency managers to be wrongly accused of theft, fraud and false accounting.
Mr Read, who previously led the Nisa convenience store group, joined the post almost a year ago.
Its decision to explore a sale of the telecoms and insurance divisions will allow the company to focus on handling mail and parcels, as well as providing cash and banking services, according to an insider.
The Post Office is a completely separate company from Royal Mail Group, which was privatized in 2013 and listed on the London Stock Exchange.
However, the two companies maintain a close commercial relationship, with the negotiation of a new ten-year agreement between them among the priorities of Mr. Read.
As with other physical retailers, the coronavirus pandemic provided a rigorous test for the management of the post.
More than 90% of its branches remained open during the crisis, and the network made a number of guaranteed hardship payments to postmasters in April and May.
The Post has also reallocated some of its currency cash delivery business to enable overnight delivery of sterling cash to meet demand.
Other main targets for the CEO over the next year will include setting up a renewed partnership with major UK banks and real estate companies, while travel and bill payment services are also expected to benefit from investments substantial.
Source : https://www.fr24news.com/a/2020/09