Korea Post focuses on high-tech mail service
Postal service has been traditionally regarded as a deficit-ridden business, largely due to its enormous labor costs. The president of Korea Post does not agree.
"Korea Post has strived to stay afloat by reducing unnecessary costs, increasing productivity and expanding businesses," said president Jung Kyung-won, who took the helm of Korea Post in April this year.
Take Korea Post`s savings and banking service called EVERRICH as an example. It has recorded a net profit of 2 trillion (USD 2.2 billion) last year. EVERRICH has a 40 trillion won savings business and a 20 trillion won insurance business, the CEO said.
In less than two months since taking office, Jung has done a lot of things and will have a lot more to do during the remainder of his tenure.
Korea Post deals with several services including postal distribution, door-to-door delivery, international express mail services, and banking and insurance services. The state-run post has about 45,000 employees — 32,000 regular employees and 13,000 part-time workers.
"Korea Post has nearly 2,800 branches across the nation so that it can render banking and insurance services to residents of remote areas such as agriculture and fisheries towns, for which most private financial institutes cannot reach," Jung said.
As a recent feat, the president yesterday visited Do Trung Ta, Chairman of the Management Board of the Viet Nam Post and Telecommunications Corporation. A memorandum of understanding was made yesterday between Korea and Vietnam to expand the two countries` bilateral ties on developing postal services, exchanging postal experts and sharing best practices.
As part of the MOU, Korea Post will dispatch a team of experts to boost the information systems at the postal service of Vietnam, and help domestic postal-related companies such as equipment makers and IT solution providers expand overseas on the back of Korea`s high-tech postal system.
Jung will give a keynote speech at the UPU-ITU Summit that will take place this Friday in Berne, Switzerland. He had been asked to talk about and share Korea Post`s electronic commerce system and experiences by two organizers of the conference, the Universal Postal Union and International Telecommunication Union.
The UPU and the ITU are specialized agencies of the United Nations in the postal and information-technology sectors.
The summit, focusing on the role of the postal sector in the information society, will gather key decision makers in the postal regulation and development area from 191 UPU member countries, including Swiss Federal Department of Transport, Communications and Energy Minister Moritz Leuenberger and Tunisian Minister of Communications Technologies Montasser Ouaili.
"The summit will be an opportunity to prove Korea`s unique combination of information technology infrastructure and postal service all out to the world," Jung said.
The nation`s high-tech postal system can be illustrated by the "PostNet." Korea Post introduced this integrated nationwide postal system with an investment of 32 billion won (USD 34 million) during 2001-2004. PostNet is a real-time service that tracks post from registration to delivery.
Customers can check delivery status via www.koreapost.go.kr or www.epost.go.kr They can also opt to receive electronic tickets or mobile text-message notices for delivery confirmation.
"What most counts during my tenure is to improving the quality of service for customers," the president stressed.
