Posten Norgen (Norway Post) has decided that no employees in Norway will be laid off for the time being despite the impact of the coronavirus crisis on business and operations.
CEO Tone Wille declared: “Norway Post has a critical task in society, and that is even more important in situations such as Norway is in now. We have an important social role in delivering mail, goods and supplies to the entire country in this pandemic crisis and we want to maintain a readiness to ensure good deliveries.
“At the same time, we want to give our employees confidence that they will not be hit financially. We will therefore not lay off anyone until it becomes absolutely necessary,” she underlined.
Posten Norge said its postal business is operating as normal throughout the country while there is strong growth in e-commerce at present, especially for pharmacy products and home delivery of foods. In other fields, however, there is a downturn in deliveries, for example to businesses that have shut down and stopped ordering goods.
“We are working with the union representatives on how we can redeploy employees so that employees can work across functions and units. It also helps that we have high readiness to be able to secure deliveries even if sick leave is higher,” Wille said.
Like most postal and parcel delivery companies, Norway Post has also initiated several measures to avoid the risk of infection between employees, as well as between employees and customers, including non-contact deliveries.
