Austrian Post is launching a new portfolio of mail products on 1 May, in an attempt to simplifyshipping processes for customers and remain competitive in the newly liberalised postal market.
It claims the new product range will offer clearer tariffs, simpler handling and greateravailability. It is based on five standard formats: Standard, Standard Plus, Maxi, Maxi Plus andLarge Letter, as opposed to 14 different product prices previously. Customers can already stamptheir shipments at home, and all letter sizes can be posted in one of 17,000 letter boxes acrossAustria, simplifying the shipping process. In addition, the 15 previous stamp values have beenreduced to only six, ensuring clear franking for all destinations worldwide.
In future, customers will also be able to choose between different delivery speeds. A ‘premiumproduct’ ensure mail delivery the next day, while the cheaper ‘economy product’ is offered for maildelivery within 2-3 days.
The price tariffs are as follows: domestic letters weighing up to 20 g in the price categoryStandard will cost € 0.62 as a premium product and €0.57 for the economy version. Standard Plusletters between 20 and 50 g will cost €0.90 for premium and €0.80 for the economical delivery. TheMaxi service covers letters weighing up to 500 g, priced at €1.45 and €1.25 as premium and economyproducts respectively. Maxi Plus is designed for letters up to 1,000 g at a price of €2.90 forpremium and €2.60 for economy. Large letters weighing up to 2,000 can be sent as a regular parcelfor €3.80, saving 40 cents on the current price of €4.20.
The new tariff structure follows a large customer survey that Austrian Post carried out inautumn last year, with 300,000 people participating. The survey revealed that 94% of respondentswere very satisfied with the mail delivery and 87% with the parcel delivery of the Austrian postaloperator. More than 70% of the people surveyed considered it important to continue receiving theirparcels from Austrian Post while 91% said they put their trust in the post and its postmen.
However, the survey also revealed that customers desired more individual products and servicewith simpler handling and more transparency, especially as the product portfolio had become largerand more confusing since the last postal reform eight years ago.
Nearly half of the Austrians surveyed said they would be interested in picking up and handing intheir parcels, mail and personally addressed shipments to a delivery place of their choice. Torespond to this need, Austrian Post plans to introduce a ‘Post-Box’ for customers to be able toreceive their parcels round the clock so they don’t have to go to the post office. These post boxeswould be established, for example, at the entrances to houses, near their respective letter boxes.Postal delivery staff could leave the parcels of customers who were not at home at the time ofdelivery. Recipients could then open the box by entering an individual code and take out theparcel.
The Austrian postal operator is also working on expanding its online services. According to thesurvey, half of the respondents are interested in those but don’t seem to be sufficiently informedabout the different internet offers. Therefore, Austrian Post aims to increase the communication inthis regard and further expand its product portfolio online.
