Israel Post is upgrading its operations with the purchase of automatic mail sorting equipmentfrom the Italian postal systems supplier Elsag Datamat.
The NIS 50 million (€10 million) investment is part of the company’s long-term initiative toimprove infrastructure, technological development and automate operations, Israel’s Englishnewspaper The Jerusalem Post reported.
With the new equipment, the Israel Postal Company (IPC) expects to sort 70% of its mailautomatically. The machines will be installed in the IPC’s three main sorting centres in Tel Aviv,Haifa and Jerusalem, speeding up mail handling significantly.
According to Hanan Peretz, IPC’s director of logistics and business development, the newequipment enables hands-free sorting of mail from the moment it arrives in the centre until itreaches the postman.
“The machines can read handwriting and translate it into a code readable by computers, whichthen sort it all the way down to the individual mail delivery route or the closest deliverystation,” said Peretz. “The purchase allows us to more than double our automatic sortingcapabilities, from 30% today to 70% once the machines are installed. This saves us time andexpenses and improves the service to the customer.”
Peretz stressed that contrary to common belief, the widespread use of electronic mail has notmade regular mail obsolete. “The IPC sorts over 2 million mail items every day. There are manythings that need to get from one place to another and not everything can be done via e-mail.”
He added that the new equipment would not lead to dismissals in the company but rather totransfers of staff within the organisation. “Today, the IPC employs 7,000 workers. We hope thatthat number will remain constant in years to come, despite an expansion in activity and a growingpopulation,” Peretz concluded.
In 2006, the IPC changed from a government-operated service to a government-owned company. In2007, the postal industry was opened to competition allowing new players into the mail deliverymarket. Peretz said that the new purchase enabled the IPC to remain ahead of the competitorsoffering better and quicker service.
The Israel Postal Company has the largest postal network throughout the country. It employs1,650 postal delivery staff and 2,000 service representatives providing a variety of about 100innovative and online products and services. The company has 700 postal branches and 4,262 mailcollection boxes across Israel. Operating a fleet of 1,000 vehicles, it sorts 2.5 million postalitems every day equalling 787 million postal items per year and transports 1.6 million parcels and2.3 million express shipments annually.
