Mexico plans to upgrade Postal Service
The Mexican government plans to upgrade the country’s much-criticized postal service and signed an agreement Tuesday with the U.S. Postal Service to help in the process.
Communications and Transport Minister Luis Tellez said the Mexican Postal Service, or Sepomex, has been neglected for years, while the USPS is “an example of modernity, efficiency and quality.”
Under the agreement signed Tuesday, Sepomex staff will visit U.S. facilities to analyze procedures and equipment, and the two will also cooperate to improve cross-border services.
The agreement also includes the development of a tracking and location system for the implementation in 2009 of a payment-by-performance agreement for packages.
The USPS will also support Mexico in setting up a postal inspection group, including selection, recruitment and training of inspectors.
U.S. chief postal inspector Alexander Lazaroff said at the signing event that the agreement will address security concerns in both countries with enhanced security procedures.
Tellez told reporters the government plans to make significant investments in the modernization and automation of the postal service.
At present, “a lot of letters get lost that our countrymen send to their families from the U.S., sometimes with money, sometimes with some object of value,” he said.
At the same time, Sepomex has only two corporate customers – phone company Telefonos de Mexico (TMX) and Citigroup Inc.’s (C) local unit, Banamex. The rest use package delivery services because the postal system didn’t give them the service they needed, Tellez said.
As part of its modernization strategy, Sepomex also signed an agreement with Mexico’s Federal Electoral Institute, which will provide the postal service with its database of addresses of registered voters.
Officials said the information, which will be provided twice a year, will help the postal service improve, given frequent problems locating addresses in both urban and rural areas.
The Communications and Transport Ministry said Sepomex is prohibited from marketing the information in any form.
In 2003, there was an outcry in Mexico when U.S. data-gathering concern Choicepoint Inc. (CPS) sold U.S. law enforcement agencies confidential information from Mexico’s voter registry that it had obtained from Mexican companies.
