Deutsche Post – key prices for letters and postcards to be maintained in 2004
Deutsche Post will be maintaining its key prices for letters and postcards in the coming year. The Regulatory Authority for Telecommunications and Posts has approved the rates from 1 January 2004 as part of the review it conducts every year. Under the new scale of rates, “Standardbrief” items (up to 20 grams) will continue to cost EUR 0.55, “Kompaktbrief” items (up to 50 grams) will still cost EUR 1.00, “Großbrief” items (up to 500 grams) EUR 1.44, “Maxibrief” items (up to 1,000 grams) EUR 2.20 and postcards EUR 0.45.
The dispatch of light “Infobrief” items, which can, for instance, be used to send invitations or circulars, will become much more cost-effective. The price of a standard “Infobrief” item (up to 20 grams) will fall from EUR 0.45 to EUR 0.40, while compact “Infobrief” items (up to 50 grams) will in future cost EUR 0.80 instead of up to EUR 0.90. The requirement for dispatching “Infobrief” items is a minimum of 50 items with identical contents.
In the case of “Infopost” addressed advertising, the price for standard “Infopost” items (up to 20 grams) will be going up by one cent to EUR 0.25. The different rates for compact “Infopost” items (up to 50 grams) will be dropping by two cents.
There will be a few price changes in the international area as well: the price for dispatching a standard airmail letter worldwide, for instance, will increase from EUR 1.50 to EUR 1.55, while the rate for worldwide “Maxibrief” items (airmail) in the 50 to 100 gram weight category will drop from EUR 5.00 to EUR 4.00.
Deutsche Post will have copies of its free information booklet “Service-Informationen” (Service Information) available for customers at its retail outlets well in advance of the change.
The German price for a standard letter is midway down the European price league table at seventh place. In northern European countries, but also in Italy and in Switzerland, it costs more to send a letter. If criteria such as high German wage costs and quality features are taken into account, Deutsche Post is actually one of the less expensive European postal companies. The price of a standard letter sent using Deutsche Post is the same for all destinations within Europe: sending a letter from Berlin to London, Paris or Rome, for instance, costs EUR 0.55, which is the same as it costs to send a letter from Hamburg to Munich. In twelve European countries, it is more expensive to send a standard letter to another European country than it is in Germany.
© Copyright 2003 Deutsche Post AG / Masthead
