Will letter delivery on Mondays be removed in the future? If it goes after the FDP, that would be possible. In an application, the parliamentary group writes that Monday delivery should no longer be mandatory. The liberals make this conditional on Deutsche Post delivering significantly more letters on Saturdays. Up to now, Swiss Post has had to deliver at least 80 percent of the letters that were dropped the previous day on a working day. The FDP wants to increase this value for Saturdays to 95 percent. This should prevent large letters from being left for days.
At the beginning of August, the Federal Ministry of Economics had submitted a key issues paper on the upcoming Postgesetz reform. Parts of the law are already more than two decades old, they are considered in the face of progressive digitization and falling letter volumes as obsolete. Among other things, the key issues paper states that they want to investigate "whether delivery on six days is still required". In doing so, the ministry refers to EU rules requiring delivery on only five days a week. By the end of the year it wants to submit a bill - it is working "at full speed," says a spokeswoman.
So far, the mail carriers of Deutsche Post have to be on the road every working day. The influence of the FDP on the legislative process is limited, given its opposition role in the Bundestag. Nevertheless, the message indicates that an end to the Monday delivery is no longer taboo. Postal topics are risky for politicians because many consumers and thus voters do not want to change their habits at the mailbox.
Rejection of SPD, Greens, AfD and Left
"Shortening the service from six to five days a week is without question a deterioration for the citizens," says the vice-chairman of the SPD parliamentary group, Sören Bartol. "We reject this."
A no comes also from the AfD, from the Greens and from the left. The left politician Pascal Meiser points out that just a hefty increase in postage has been approved and that the post-complaints rise - in his view, it would therefore be completely inappropriate to now cancel the Monday and thus make it easier for the business. The Green Katharina Dröge argues similarly.
The economic-political spokesman for the CDU and CSU parliamentary group in the Bundestag, Joachim Pfeiffer, however, points out that Germany has stricter delivery obligations than in other EU states. "Given the extensive digitalization of the economy and society, we will have to scrutinize if this is still timely." The politician does not promise to abolish Monday delivery, but at least changes. He could well imagine that customers, for example, pay for a Monday delivery "a small amount more". The faction-internal discussion on the subject is not yet so far, there is still no agreement, says Pfeiffer.
A sticking point is the question of whether a Monday-out would lead to unacceptable delays in correspondence with courts - that therefore deadlines are not met. Such court papers must be delivered by law in paper form. "As long as the state, for example, in the case of official or court communications, presupposes the classic correspondence, there must be no restriction on the delivery of letters," says Deputy Chief of the AFD Group in the Bundestag, Leif-Erik Holm.
On Mondays, Swiss Post delivers mainly private letters
For the post office, the Monday delivery is economically ballast. Because their deliverers cover all households on this day, but have only a few letters. In 2018, the letter carriers of the Bonn-based company threw 7.7 billion letters and cards in mailboxes, of which 87 percent were from companies. Companies usually send their shipments from Monday to Friday - they drop almost no shipments at the weekend. Thus, on Mondays, almost only private mail arrives, which accounts for only 13 percent of the total.
Anyone who evaluates the speech of the FDP as a career support for the Deutsche Post, but misses. The requirement to deliver more letters on Saturdays should be a feat of strength for the Group. The lead author of the application, the FDP member of parliament Reinhard Houben, says that the abolition of the assembly obligation would be financially a big advantage for the company, because then they would need less staff. "But that must not be a gift without return."
The liberal sees the role of the Post in the industry critically - in his view, it is a "quasi-monopolist", which hinders fair competition and thus a very good offer for customers. According to the Federal Network Agency, Deutsche Post DHL has a sales market share of 85 percent in the mail business. For example, Houben advocates that the "value added tax privilege" be dropped - this regulation favors the postal service, as Deutsche Post DHL does not have to pay sales tax on certain major customers, such as banks, insurance companies and public authorities. As a result, they can offer their services cheaper than the competition, which hinders competition.
