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DHL extends leading European coverage of morning deliveries

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

DHL Express is responding to the increasing demand for morning deliveries and has expanded its European coverage. Setting a new benchmark, DHL Express now reaches 80 percent of business addresses in Europe before 12:00, up by 6 percentage points compared to the end of 2006.

DHL Express is responding to the increasing demand for morning deliveries.
This development further strengthens the company’s leading geographic footprint. DHL Express offers unparalleled coverage in Europe, serving major cities as well as smaller and mid-sized towns. All of Germany and more than 90 percent of the businesses in the UK, Belgium and Netherlands are now covered before noon. In addition, significant improvements were made in 2007 in the Nordic countries and in Eastern Europe.

Along with the expanded service, DHL Express Europe is introducing a simplified product portfolio. It comprises the services DHL EXPRESS 9:00 and DHL EXPRESS 12:00 in addition to the close-of-business service DHL EXPRESS WORLDWIDE. The new portfolio is designed to make DHL Express services easier to use for customers. With the same late collection times as before, customers can select three time-defined services based on their shipping needs – with a money-back guarantee for delivery times in Europe.

DHL EXPRESS 9:00, DHL EXPRESS 12:00 and DHL EXPRESS WORLDWIDE are offered in 40 European countries and territories. * Moreover, DHL EXPRESS 12:00 service is available to 26 overseas destinations from Europe as well. “This is another milestone of DHL’s continuous investment in its network capabilities in order to secure market-leading services. Earlier this year we invested in service upgrades for deliveries to the United States. Now we are pushing our capabilities for morning deliveries in Europe to set a new benchmark,” says Thomas George, Managing Director, Marketing & Sales DHL Express Europe.

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SingPost appoints Wilson Tan as Group CEO

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

Singapore Post Limited (SingPost) today announced the appointment of Mr Wilson Tan Wee-Yan as its Group Chief Executive Officer effective 15 October 2007. Mr Tan will also join the SingPost Board as a Director.

Mr Tan, 49, joins SingPost from NEC Solutions Asia Pacific Pte Ltd (Singapore) where he held the position of Managing Director. Since 1993, Mr Tan has held key management positions with regional responsibilities in multi-national companies including Apple Computers, Informix, Software AG and Xerox Corporation, developing and growing the businesses in Asia and the region.

Mr Tan, who was named the IT Person of the Year 2005 by the Singapore Computer Society (SCS), presently holds various appointments including President of SCS and International Advisor to the Thailand Software Park. He also sits on the advisory board of various education institutions including the Institute of Systems Science (ISS) and Singapore Polytechnic School of Media and Infocomm Technology.

He is a past board member of the National Computer Board (NCB) and the Infocomm Development Authority (iDA). He had also served as Chairman of the Singapore IT Federation (SITF), Asia Oceania Computer Industry Organization (ASOCIO) and the National IT Standards Committee and was a member of the National Standards Council.

Mr Tan has served 14 years as a Board Member of Bizlink Singapore, a welfare organization dedicated to assess, train and place disabled clients.

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UK users turning to fax machines and scanners to beat Royal Mail action

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

Fax machines, scanners and online fax-to-email services have seen increased sales and usage as UK users try to beat the postal strike.

PC World and Currys reported that fax machine sales are up 25 per cent, and scanner sales 20 per cent, since the dispute began.

Online service Efax said that it had witnessed increases of “around 15 per cent” during the strike period.

“We have seen a run on faxes and scanners this week as customers have been flocking to buy them,” said Niall O’Keeffe, marketing director at PC World.

“We thought that faxes were heading for extinction with the advent of broadband, but the recent industrial action has caused us to think twice.”

Paul Geoghegan, general manager of finance at Efax, claimed that his company had also benefited during the industrial action at Royal Mail.

“There is not a uniform increase across the UK but initial figures show it’s between 12 and 20 per cent, so it probably works out around 15 per cent,” he said.

As well as running its own service, Efax handles the fax-to-email service for ‘on demand’ fax solutions provider YAC.

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Royal Mail strikes

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

Royal Mail postal workers began the first of two 48-hour strikes on Thursday 4 October. The Communication Workers Union, which represents 130,000 members of staff at the UK’s main postal service, opposes modernization plans, which it claims will result in the loss of over 40,000 jobs, longer shifts and a paltry pay packet for their members, who are already treated like slaves, says CWU Deputy General Secretary Dave Ward. The second 48-hour strike started last Monday, with further stoppages expected by mail centre and airport staff early next week. The CWU says it will embark on a rolling programme of strikes from 15 October until the dispute is resolved. According to The Sunday Telegraph, although the immediate cost of the strikes to Royal Mail will be £50m-£60m, it could eventually cost the company up to £260m.

Since the liberalisation of the postal market in 2006, 17 other companies have started delivering post alongside Royal Mail. They have already taken 40 pct of the lucrative corporate mail market and have won Government contracts from the main postal service. Royal Mail claims the failure to restructure has also cost it a recent £8m deal with Amazon, the online retailer. According to Royal Mail Chairman Allan Leighton on a recent edition of Sky News, its rivals in the postal market are 40 pct more efficient; the Royal Mail has yet to move to fully automated letter sorting, for instance. John Hutton, the minister responsible for the Royal Mail, says that “there’s no future for the business if it’s locked into the perennial cycle of industrial action… It is going to lose market share.” Couriergram, the UK-wide telegraph service, has already taken a third more business since the strike started.

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India Post offices to serve Universal Service obligation

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

Over 155,000 post offices in India are ready to serve the Universal Service Obligation, according to Director of Postal services (Mail Business), WB Circle, Harpreet Singh.

“The main aim of the postal department now is to manage post as a business,” Singh said speaking at a Customers’ meet at Yogayog Bhavan here today on the eve of World Post Day.

Singh said that the postal department would have to learn from the competitors and technological partners the need to focus on revenue generating sectors. For this purpose, he said, post office network had to be proliferated.

In the 11th plan, he said, Automated Mail Delivery System would be launched in big cities like Kolkata and Delhi “and this completely metamorphose the whole system”

He said though the postal department was a loss-making one, it was wholeheartedly trying to break-even in near future.

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High Court outlaws Royal Mail postal strikes

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

A High Court judge this evening granted an injunction by Royal Mail to block more strikes on Monday and Tuesday as its long-running dispute with the main postal union became increasingly bitter.

The postal group went to the High Court today for an injunction to stop fresh official strikes as illegal wildcat action spread to about 60 operations, involving more than 4,000 employees.

On Wednesday, when four days of official national strikes ended, wildcat walkouts began at 24 Royal Mail centers in protest at new shift patterns.

Today the unofficial action hit Edinburgh and Grangemouth along with the previously affected areas of south and east London and Liverpool. The wildcat action is halting work at major mail sorting centers and delivery operations, leaving some areas without post for more than a week.

Royal Mail has now lost more than one million working days to strikes since the Communication Workers Union began industrial action in July. The dispute – one of the worst in the organisation’s history – is over pay, pensions, job cuts and working patterns. It is Royal Mail’s demand for greater flexibility in working hours that is causing the biggest problem for settling the dispute.

Talks continue between the union and Royal Mail at the TUC, chaired by the TUC general secretary Brendan Barber. The TUC has now hosted more than a week of virtually round-the-clock talks.

Royal Mail’s injunction claims that the union had given flawed notification of the strikes. Although the union gave notice within the proper timeframe of a week, proper notification also requires that every workplace affected is properly detailed. Royal Mail’s solicitors provided a 15-page petition to the High Court saying that the notification was not filed properly.

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Small business is big loser in UK postal strike

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

Small businesses are one of the biggest losers in the on-going postal strike, industry leaders said.

As the long-running dispute rumbles on, with postal workers staging a third day of unofficial strike action, the Federation of Small Businesses said its members were being badly affected.

Spokesman Simon Briault said a whole range of businesses, from building and plumbing firms to mail order companies were being hit. The federation said 94 pct of its members exclusively use the Royal Mail – many to send cheques and invoices through the post.

‘The other 6 pct who use alternative mail carriers often rely on the Royal Mail for that last mile,’ Mr Briault said.

In a survey on postal services carried out by the federation, 88 pct of respondents said they send post every day, while 69 pct said they send invoices through the post. The federation said business mail constitutes 87 pct of mail sent and the small business dependence on the postal system in the UK should not be underestimated.

Mr Briault said a lot of small businesses still used cheques to do business and these were being delayed in the post. He added: ‘When that is disrupted it has a direct impact on cashflow. Small business don’t have big profit margins.

‘They have to borrow more money from the bank which results in them paying more interest charges. Small business contribute 50 pct to the GDP. This postal strike is a massive issue.

Talks aimed at resolving the long-running dispute will resume later today in a bid to avert a fresh round of official strikes called by the Communication Workers Union from next Monday. Up to 130,000 union members have held two 48-hour strikes in the past week which crippled mail deliveries across the country.

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Bangladesh to privatize postal network

Posted by | Oct 12, 2007 | |

Bangladesh’s state-owned post and telecom network will be turned into a public limited corporation (PLC), a move that follows the privatization of Bangladesh Biman, the national airline.

Bangladesh Telegraph and Telephone Board (BTTB) has been a state-run network like such operations across South Asia. The government now wants to convert it into a PLC but wants to retain full control.

The move is to cut the red tape that causes delays, officials say. Ostensibly, a PLC would also enable outside funding.

The BTTB earns Tk 1.5 billion (USD 23 million) on an average annually, which it deposits with the exchequer. It gets an allocation under an annual development program to bear its operational costs that BTTB officials say involves a cumbersome bureaucratic process.

According to the draft ordinance, the state-owned BTTB will become a fully government-owned PLC named Bangladesh Telecom Company Ltd, New Age said yesterday.

The state-owned mobile operator, Teletalk Bangladesh Ltd, will be its subsidiary, but run by a separate management.

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