An Post future plans

styron

An Post plans look far from rosy

It is understood An Post is now looking at several possibilities for the future of the service. These are believed to include the closure of over 400 rural post offices, the closure of two temporary sorting centres in Dublin, and the downsizing and the possible closure of two of An Post’s four sorting centres as the company looks to parcel deliveries for increased revenue.

The four permanent sorting centres are located in Cork, Dublin, Portlaoise and Athlone. The mail centre in Athlone is believed to be most under threat, while Portlaoise - which deals with parcels and mail - could be scaled back. An Post delivers two million letters daily but has the capacity to deal with four million. It is thought the changes being considered across the company could result in between 1,000 and 1,500 job losses.

“From that point onwards as we enter this new economy, the economy I am referring to is the e-commerce economy, as we enter that and as parcels start taking over as the mail volumes decline, we will have business that is growing again,†said [CEO] Mr McRedmond.

He had earlier outlined his vision to double the level of ad mailing-which he said was worth €60 million at the moment- and said, “we can become one of the largest media companies by really having that focus. We have a fantastic product with the ad mailing product.â€

Mr McRedmond also noted that sellers were often taking on the price of post as online shopping continues to enjoy growth. “In five years time at least 50 per cent of all non food shopping will be online,†he said. “We have to move very fast. The decline in mail volumes is such that it puts this company under a lot of pressure so we need to move fast."

While An Post’s CEO received applause at the event, one delegate was overheard in the hotel corridor remarking that there hadn’t been as much blood letting in the GPO in 1916.

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/an-post-due-to-make-loss-again-despite-stamp-price-increase-1.3064851?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

This warrants its own thread, so I split it off from the Chinese imports thread. This forum seems as good a place as any for it.

my3cents

An Post profiting by delivering junk mail - lovely

hmmm

They had challenges from the decline in postal mail because of the rise of email, but equally they had amazing opportunities in delivering packages with the rise of online shopping.

Instead they slipped into the same old lazy semi-state thinking and are now in big trouble. Even their new parcel collection service is designed more around them and less around the consumer.

They have one last chance with the rise in online grocery shopping - but I doubt they have the ambition or flexibility in work practices to be able to take advantage of this. Is anyone in AP testing drones? Have they talked to the retailers about whether they can be used to deliver groceries? Have they looked at Parcel Motel like collection points? Have they looked at collection depots open at times convenient for their customers?

McLoughlin

Addresspal are looking into a postal re direct service from USA if they can introduce that at a good price it could be successful

etselbbuns

AnPost is Ireland's most reputable company according to the self-styled reputations agency
http://bizplus.ie/post-irelands-reputable-company/

whiterebel

Voting was before their latest round of exorbitant postal increases, obviously.

bk

An Post face massive challenges and if they are to survive they will need to undergo massive changes to their business.

Post offices are under massive pressure, most of their business, 70%+ is actually financial services, not post and parcels. Social service payments and NTMA make up 55% of their business on it's own and the rest being bill pay, etc.

However this business is decreasing quickly and expected to continue to decrease as people move to online services and direct debit payments.

The post masters today are blathering on about the government putting more services in post offices, but the reality is the government don't want to do that, as it is much cheaper for the government to deliver such services online and most people prefer it that way.

I see little hope for much of the post office network, much of it will close.

In terms of flat mail, volumes are way down and expected to continue to fall. Increasing mail prices aren't going to help much obviously as it will simply make people think twice about using mail and will push business even more towards online billing, etc.

I suspect that in time we will see post move to an every second day service. I suspect most people wouldn't care anyway * and it would allow them to cut in half the number of postal delivery staff.

* As it is I only check my post box once or twice a week, it is almost never urgent these days. Most is spam, the rest is paper bills that I've already gotten a copy by email anyway. Note, post box is down the hall in my apartment building.

In terms of parcel deliveries, they do have a great chance to grow their business there. However they seriously need to improve there technology and processes.

I tried AddressPal when it first launched and what a shockingly bad service! Very badly designed, clearly designed around their old fashioned network rather then the needs of their customers.

- Pick up the parcel from a post office with terrible opening times, not suited to working people, sort of goes against the whole idea of a service like this!
- Queue up behind a bunch of OAP's for half an hour.
- No tracking of your package, you only get notified of it when it arrives in the local post office and the staff their remember to scan it!!! Which in my experience they often forget to do for days on end!
- Takes ages for them to scan and give you the package when you are there.
- Terrible long ID that made no sense from day one.
- ID includes the post office ID, which means they have to give you a new ID and send you a new card every time you want to change post office!

Non of it makes sense. Literally the only good thing about this service is their presence in mainland England. Otherwise I'd always use PM or PW.

They really need to follow Deustche Posts example and put Parcel Motel style lockers outside every post office. 24/7 parcel pickup and sending without needing to step in the rubbish post office, brilliant.

Also I like the way Deustche Post will first try and deliver a parcel to your home, if you aren't home then they place the parcel in the closest locker to you and leave a letter on how to collect it, even if you never signed up to the service. 24/7 collections, nice.

I'd also love if they improved their IT systems to be more like the awesome DPD system. Text notification in the morning of upcoming parcel delivery that day and a one hour window for the delivery. Option to allow you to re-organise delivery for another day, place, leave it with a neighbour, in a locker, etc.

An Post really have a lot to do to sort their issues.

zynaps

"one delegate was overheard in the hotel corridor remarking that there hadn't been as much blood letting in the GPO in 1916."

Okay, that was pretty good :pac:

Doltanian

I think you should be able to pay your Motor tax in the post office and hey print you off your disk there in the PO.

ei9go

Doltanian wrote: »

I think you should be able to pay your Motor tax in the post office and hey print you off your disk there in the PO.

Why?

It's so much easier to do it online.

joujoujou

Believe it or not, plenty of people are still permanently offline.

bk

joujoujou wrote: »

Believe it or not, plenty of people are still permanently offline.

And they don't have access to internet at library or a family or friends home?!

The report into the post office network does talk about putting more government services like this in the post office network. But the reality is the government isn't in favour of it as it is more costly and people are moving to online services in massive numbers anyway.

It is clear, from the report, that such services would be a drop in the ocean and would do little to save the post office network.

Doltanian

The vast majority of 60+ people are computer illiterate.

bk

Doltanian wrote: »

The vast majority of 60+ people are computer illiterate.

And they don't have family, friends, neighbours or carers that can help them?

styron

Also ECDL/ICDL established a couple of decades now and voluntary run smart outreach courses including library access, Silver Surfer awards etc. - take up enhanced with cheap net book & tablets.

joujoujou

bk wrote: »

And they don't have family, friends, neighbours or carers that can help them?

What if they prefer to do that on their own?

Any of activities you mentioned (family, friends, library, etc) requires them to go out anyway, so why not to the post office? With all due respect, but your arguments (IMO) sound like excuses.

The Parish Priest.

I have never been able to understand this crazy idea that lots of Irish people seem to have that every tiny little village needs a post office, and that postmen are some sort of public health nurse to check on elderly people.

McLoughlin

Was handed a Postrewards card this week when collecting some addresspal parcels https://postrewards.ie/

Collect points in post office for discounts but looking at the "rewards" is doesn't seem worth it

HorseSea

No, as I post quite a bit I am already up to 400 points and there is nothing of any interest there to me. The most expensive in points terms offer is 30 points, maybe as time goes on they will add something interesting requiring more points ? ? ?

McLoughlin wrote: »

Was handed a Postrewards card this week when collecting some addresspal parcels https://postrewards.ie/

Collect points in post office for discounts but looking at the "rewards" is doesn't seem worth it

L1011

The vast majority of those "offers" don't cost them anything - you can negotiate that deal with the provider in return for bringing the sale to them at all. Contra deal, nobody pays anyone. Is there anything there that doesn't need cash to redeem? Can't find anything anyway

HorseSea

Yes agreed, in other words fairly useless. Unless they add something decent there will be no point in heavy users collecting the points, it won't be worth the effort to swipe the card!

L1011 wrote: »

The vast majority of those "offers" don't cost them anything - you can negotiate that deal with the provider in return for bringing the sale to them at all. Contra deal, nobody pays anyone. Is there anything there that doesn't need cash to redeem? Can't find anything anyway

whiterebel

I presume this is part of the "new" An Post: Text received this morning from AP.
"Dear Customer, your item is out for delivery today. If you will not be home, call 0xxxxxx to agree alternative delivery arrangements"

Not an inkling of time or who it is from. I'm expecting a parcel from Amazon, so I think this is it.

styron

whiterebel wrote: »

I presume this is part of the "new" An Post: Text received this morning from AP.
"Dear Customer, your item is out for delivery today. If you will not be home, call 0xxxxxx to agree alternative delivery arrangements"

Not an inkling of time or who it is from. I'm expecting a parcel from Amazon, so I think this is it.

An Post are moving to an extra weekday evening and weekend parcel delivery model:

An Post staff will now attempt to deliver parcels to customers at least three times before directing them to collect their items at a sorting depot.
They will also contact the customer by phone if the details are provided and, if requested, will leave parcels with neighbours or an alternative location.

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/retail-and-services/an-post-to-deliver-parcels-on-saturday-for-online-shoppers-1.3123033

caviardreams

Will be interesting to see if you can actually specify evening delivery or saturday delivery etc. from the off. Would save me a fortune in parcel motel fees tbh and is something An Post should have done years ago.

I would have had no problem paying say €20 a year for the ability to have guaranteed evening deliveries for example (as there is nobody at home to take in parcels during the working day)

CeilingFly

caviardreams wrote: »

Will be interesting to see if you can actually specify evening delivery or saturday delivery etc. from the off. Would save me a fortune in parcel motel fees tbh and is something An Post should have done years ago.

I would have had no problem paying say €20 a year for the ability to have guaranteed evening deliveries for example (as there is nobody at home to take in parcels during the working day)

You can't specify a Saturday delivery with an post directly, but it will be an option for online retailers to specify soon.

Obviously it will just be those based in Ireland, but it will mean parcels dispatched on Fridays for a domestic address will be scheduled for delivery on Saturday. Their systems automatically recognise difference between domestic and commercial addresses

El Inho

What do ye think about the new AddressPal virtual US address?

https://addresspal.anpost.ie/

Note: The following link is from a site I write for - I've rounded up everything about the new feature, so hoping it's relevant.

http://goos3d.ie/you-can-now-ship-packages-to-ireland-from-the-us-with-addresspal/