Deutsche Post continues its service offensive
1,000 sales points for letter and parcel stamps will be set up all over Germany this year.
Jürgen Gerdes, Board Member for MAIL and PARCEL Germany and MAIL International has announced that the provision of postal services throughout the country and service quality will be further extended.
"The retail outlet network is growing instead of shrinking. Service is getting better, not worse. Our range of products is increasing, not decreasing," states Gerdes. He called on the customers of the company not to be alarmed by the differing statements in the run-up to the collective wage negotiations and the ensuing political discussions.
Jürgen Gerdes underlined Deutsche Post's commitment to universal service and explained again that a reduction of the retail outlet network would not be up for debate. On the contrary, the number of retail outlets requested by the legislator (12,000 outlets), which has clearly been exceeded, was again significantly increased last year with the establishment of 600 POSTPOINTS.
Gerdes has announced that further retail outlets will be set up in the POSTPOINT format. Despite this, Deutsche Post will be able to manage the costs of the retail outlet network in the interest of its customers.
The business hours of the retail outlet network are improved
"A contribution to this is also made by the ongoing conversion of retail outlets operated by Deutsche Post into retail outlets operated by partners. We have been implementing this for many years with great success and to the customers' complete satisfaction," says Gerdes. "At the same time, the business hours of our retail outlet network are being improved, we are supporting the retail trade and we are accommodating the shopping behavior of our customers." Furthermore, the approx. 850 Postbank Finance Centers are operated as "flagship" retail outlets as part of Postbank's customer-orientated offering.
More than 13,500 retail outlets serve between two and three million customers every day. Average weekly opening hours have more than doubled (42 hours at present) since 1990 (18 hours). More than 90 percent of customers are served within three minutes. Not least, the decisive quality improvement during recent years has contributed to the fact that Deutsche Post's retail outlet network continuously achieves high satisfaction ratings in customer surveys.
Approx. 50 Post 24/7 locations will be installed by the end of April
According to Jürgen Gerdes, the country-wide network of business mail drop-off points for commercial customers is to be further extended from currently 200 to 1,000 offices by the end of the year. The number of self-service features that have been introduced with great success to complement the retail outlet network will be significantly increased. By the end of May there will be 1,000 PAKETBOXES (currently 550) and 2,500 PACKSTATIONS by the end of next year (currently 900).
In addition, approx. 50 Post 24/7 locations will be installed by the end of April as part of another pilot project in Bonn and Berlin enabling customers to use almost all postal services round the clock. In addition, 1,000 sales points for letter and parcel stamps will be set up all over Germany this year. According to Gerdes, the countrywide network of more than 100,000 collection boxes will definitely not be reduced; here, too, the trend is rather to extend the network.
Jürgen Gerdes has announced that an offering that has been tested in a pilot project since 2007 will be extended to include other test areas, i.e. post carriers service. This is an additional service such as collecting letters and parcels or ordering selected products that the postal carrier provides at the customer's door. Jürgen Gerdes states that "this business idea takes the services from our retail outlets to our customers' homes."
