Finnish Post Office workers walk out to protest further privatization
Some 1,300 workers closed 300 post offices nationwide Friday to protest further privatization plans that would move postal services to local kiosks.
The one-day protest, called by unions, did not affect normal deliveries of mail and newspapers.
Concerned about layoffs after the state-run Finland Post Corp. began privatization three years ago, workers fear the new plans to give business to eight kiosks in southern Finland will further reduce personnel.
“If it proves to be economically viable, they will expand the experiment and there could be up to 1,000 layoffs,” Antti Palkkinen from the Union of Post Office Employees, said.
Finland Post said the move would improve services.
“We want to serve our customers as well as possible and in this way we can provide them with long opening hours,” company spokeswoman Hannele Meller said.
Post offices are normally open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., while kiosks can open at 7 a.m. and close as late as 10 p.m.
Since 1999, the national post office has reduced personnel by 2,000 to 23,000, and sold 1,100 branch offices to private businesses. It also ended a 110-year cooperation with the state-owned Leonia Bank, which had enabled customers to pay bills and borrow money at post offices.
