Postal Digest: India developing postal bank; Poste Italiane pilots work vouchers

Some more postal news from around the world, including a casual work payment service in Italy, celebration of catalogues in Russia and search for a postal chief in Estonia…

Indian minister confirms postal bank feasibility project

The Indian government is looking into the possibility of setting up a postal banking system, as part of efforts to improve access to financial services in rural areas.

India’s communications minister Shri Sachin Pilot informed the country’s parliament today that the project is underway, though at an early stage. India Post does already provide various financial services, including savings accounts, insurance and money transfer services, but does not provide loans or credit. The Post Bank of India could include involvement by other public sector banks, such as the State Bank of India.

“The Department of Posts has a proposal to look into the feasibility of setting up a postal bank to provide full-fledged banking facilities to the rural as well as urban masses in the country, which is still at a conceptual state,” said the minister in a statement.

Russian Post celebrates partnership with catalogue giant

Russian Post held a ceremony this week celebrating the mailing of 15m catalogues from German mail order giant Otto Group.

The celebration in the city of Tver, north-west of Moscow, saw officials from Otto’s Russian subsidiary and from Russian Post acknowledging the ability for catalogues to expand retail choice for residents in some of the most remote areas of Russia.

Otto Group has established its own logistics centre in Tver, which now sends more than 50,000 parcels each day to Russian consumers. Russian Post is currently working to improve its automated sorting capacity in the Moscow region to cope with growing parcel volumes.

Poste Italiane pilots voucher programme for casual labour

Post offices in the Lombardy and Puglia regions of Italy are piloting a new payment programme for local businesses to pay for casual labour.

Working with the Italian social security agency INPS, the pilot involves local businesses buying up to EUR 5,000 a day in vouchers from the post office, which can then be used as payment for temporary workers, who can cash in the vouchers at a postal counter. The employer notifies the INPS at the start of a work project, via internet or phone, with various details that then allows the temporary work to count towards pension programmes and comply with tax requirements.

The programme is set to be rolled out nationwide, to all 14,000 post offices in Italy, from February 2012.

Estonian Post seeks chief executive with international experience

The Supervisory Board of Estonian Post (Eesti Post) has begun its bid to replace Ahti Kallaste as chief executive, who is set to join his family company from March 2012.

The company said yesterday it was seeking a candidate for the role with international management experience, as well as at least three years’ management experience in a medium or large business.

Those interested in the job are being asked to provide a proposal for Estonian Post’s strategic direction over the coming years.

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