TNT Post has won a court case against Deutsche Post enabling it to continue using the term “Post”in Germany. It has also rejected union claims that it is relying on “child labour” for letter
deliveries in Germany.A Nuremberg regional court has rejected an appeal by Deutsche Post that TNT Post’s use ofthe word “Post” infringes the German national postal operator’s brand, and ruled that mailcompetitors are entitled to combine the word “Post” with their own company name. The Nurembergruling followed a similar verdict by a Hamburg court.
“The verdict makes it clear that the term “Post” is not a privilege of the formermonopolist,” declared Mario Frusch, head of TNT Post in Germany. “As a challenger to Deutsche Post,we see this as an important signal one year before the complete liberalisation of the German postalmarket.”
Deutsche Post had patented the word “Post” at end-2003 and took legal action against TNT tostop it using its former brand “TPG Post” in Germany. The German federal patents court is due todecide shortly whether the word “Post” should be formally deleted from the list of registeredtrademarks.
Meanwhile, TNT Post Germany has denied claims by the Ver.di union that it is using teenagersto deliver mail and that it is relying on “child labour” to build up a national delivery network inGermany. Ver.di, which represents most postal workers in Germany, claimed that TNT wanted firstlyto use teenagers to distribute brochures and sales prospects, and then mail at a later stage.
TNT Post Germany confirmed that teenagers were distributing brochures in line with Germanlaw but stressed that this was not part of the regulated postal market but rather the newspaperdelivery sector. It clarified that it was not using teenagers to distribute letters, and that itwas not building up a postal network by taking on teenage employees.
