Tag: Poczta Polska

Poczta Polska, the Polish postal operator, is to build new sorting centres in four cities at a cost of PLN (Polish zlotych) 480 million (EUR 122.7 million), according to reports in the Polish media.

The centres, part of a programme to improve infrastructure and the quality of services, are to be constructed in Wroclaw, Katowice, Gdansk and Bydgoszcz, said the Polish News Bulletin. Each of them is to cost PLN 120 million (EUR 30.68 million), the newspaper says.

The post, which recently lost one of its biggest customers, TP (Polish Telecom), to emerging rival Krakow-based InPost and suffered a wave of industrial action, nevertheless recorded a profit of PLN 300 million (EUR 76.7 million) in 2006 on 7% year-on-year revenue growth.

It awarded over 100,000 postal workers pay rises worth a total PLN 60 million (EUR 15.34 million) to resolve a dispute that threatened to blow up into a full-out nationwide strike.

Polish Post’s director general, Zbigniew Niezgoda, is quoted as saying liberalisation of the below-50g, PLN 2.5 billion (EUR 638 million) mail market by 2009 – desired by the European Commission – “should not be a problem”.

Privatisation of Poczta Polska is not expected to take place before 2011, the newspaper reports.

The strike organised by employees of Poczta Polska Polish mail was a gift from the heavens for rival companies, which are hiring new staff and opening new branches in order to make the best of the situation while it lasts. Rafal Brzoska, CEO of Poczta Polska rival InPost, admits that his firm is unable to cope with the immense demand. Over the last 10 days, the company has increased its workforce by 150 people and is planning to open four new outlets in the next two weeks. According to Brzoska, it still needs to hire from 350 to 850 new staff. As long as the strike continues, Poczta Polska will lose more and more customers to the competition. To make matters worse, some of them can be expected to claim compensation for incurred losses. Such a move is being considered by e-shop Stereo.pl, which had to switch to more costly courier mail services in order to deliver its goods to buyers.

The European Commission (EC) is opening up the EU’s postal market to cross-border competition, and Poczta Polska must now whip itself into shape to compete with its European counterparts. And as the EU presses ahead with internal market reforms, many of Poland’s state monopolies could find themselves forced to compete with foreign companies on their own turf.

The EC has cracked open the postal market, which could be the first step in dismantling barriers to sectors traditionally controlled by state giants. Poczta Polska is in for a rough ride, as it will have to transform itself to cope with competition from foreign and domestic firms; and the Polish antitrust regulator is also taking a harder line in other sectors. “In preparing the proposal, we have put consumer and user needs first. With full market opening in 2009, we can look forward to more innovation, better services and improved efficiency,” said Internal Market and Services Commissioner Charlie McCreevy. “Without it, EU postal markets will be increasingly unable to meet the challenges of the ‘communications revolution.'” While this is unlikely to ruffle those outside the industry, it should be remembered that Poczta Polska is one of the biggest companies in the country. Company revenues last reached 6.5 billion zloty (EUR1.67 billion), with net profit at 101 million zloty. It currently employs nearly 100,000 people and has a vast network of 8,400 offices – some of which can be found even in the most remote parts of Poland.