NZ Post delivers a NZD20 fee

New Zealand Post is to start charging people NZD20 to have their mail redirected and NZD5 to have it held while they are away from home.

The present redirection service for residential customers is free for the first two months, with a tiered cost structure lasting four months, six months or one year.

From November 1, residential customers will have to pay NZD20 for the first two months for the redirection service.

The service will still cost NZD30 for four months, NZD45 for six months but has dropped from NZD100 to NZD85 for one year.

NZ Post’s hold service, which is used to hold mail for short periods while customers are away, will now cost residential customers NZD5 a week after having been free of charge for up to 12 weeks.

Consumers Institute chief executive David Russell described the move as “just another imposition on the long-suffering consumer”.

“Sadly there is little consumers can do because to all intents and purposes, NZ Post is a monopoly,” he said.

NZ Post marketing general manager Graham Smith said redirecting mail was expensive and labour- intensive. Business customers already paid for a permanent redirection and that price would not change. The hold service would now cost businesses NZD10 a week.

Senior citizens would be exempt from the new redirection fee for the first two months and from all hold fees.

NZ Post spokesman Richard MacLean said the new fees were not a money-making venture. “Basically it’s costing us a considerable amount of money to provide these services and we are just trying to recover our costs.”

He estimated about 600,000 people used both services every year but did not want to comment on how much money the new fees would generate.