Q-Post hit by a huge rise in inflation rate
Rising inflation badly hit the country’s postal sector last year, said Q-Post chairman Ali Mohamed al-Ali yesterday.
The chairman said the country’s postal corporation suffered heavily in 2007 because of the unprecedented inflation witnessed by Qatar.
Al-Ali said premises that the Q-Post used to acquire for as low as Q R1,500 a month for its operations in the city or suburbs was now costing at least five times more.
“As a result, our overheads on various fronts have increased considerably.”
The chairman also informed that the pay rise the Q-Post gave to its staff, both nationals and expatriates, in December 2006 too had taken a heavy toll on the corporation’s operations.
Al-Ali said the annual salary bills of the staff alone amounted to QR65mn.
Answering another query, the chairman said the postal corporation used to receive a financial support of QR52mn a year from the government until a few years ago. “That is no longer there. The absence of such financial support from the government had hit our operations hard.”
The implementation of e-cash in government transactions has also hit the corporation badly as revenues from the sales of tax and other revenue stamps that it used to receive had started going directly to the government, said al-Ali.
Despite all these, the corporation is making efforts to be self-reliant through the diversification of its businesses in a highly competitive environment, said al-Ali.
The chairman pointed out that in all large countries where the postal sector is still active; the governments had provided at least 80 pct budgetary support to their operations.
