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Friday Nov 15, 2024
Saturday, 21 June 2014 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
that all is not well with Sri Lanka’s postal services. Both operations have a history of 200 years – the postal service in Australia being started in 1809 and the one in Sri Lanka in 1815.
An ex-convict, Isaac Nichols by name, was the first Postmaster in Australia. He operated from his home in George Street, Sydney. His main job was to take charge of letters and parcels arriving by ship, to avoid the chaos of people rushing onto the ships as soon as they arrived at Sydney’s wharves.
Today Australia Post is run by the Australian Postal Corporation, a full Government-owned entity. It employs 32,000 employees but due to losses incurred over the years it has been decided to retrench 900, which has been estimated to save 900 million dollars a year. They will be from the management, supervisory, administrative and IT staff.
Another measure being considered is the cutting down of the delivery of letters from five days a week to two or three days. The number of letters sent by post has come down drastically in recent years resulting in a steady drop in revenue from letters. The government lost $ 122 million in 2011, $ 167 million in 2012 and $ 218 last year. It has been estimated that about one billion fewer letters have been sent over the past five years.
“‘The unfortunate reality is that our regulated letters business is now bleeding money - as the community shifts away from letters and towards digital forms of communication,” the CEO of the Postal Corporation said recently.
“If we wait another 12 months, it might be too late as the large losses from the letters will overwhelm the organisation.”
He added: “There is less business, so it’s harder to feed so many mouths.”
It is reported that while the population is growing and people are building more homes and apartments – thereby increasing the geographic spread and cost of deliveries – Australians are also sending far less letters.
The country being so vast, the cost of letter delivery is immense. In the less populated areas the postmen have to cover long distances.
Until a few decades ago, Australia boasted of the world’s longest overland mail route – the driving distance of which was 708 km. Then there were only a few roads and a round trip would take seven days.
Today there are 7,950 postal routes serviced by 10,000 “posties”. Motorcycles are used for delivery for around 6,600 routes, bicycles for 350 routes and walking for 1,000 routes. Vehicles are only used for the very longest routes.
The most isolated postbox is located on a dive platform on the Great Barrier Reef, Queensland. The most isolated Post Office is located 217 km (135 mi) from Onslow, Western Australia, 32 km (20 mi) from the nearest customer.
