Chaos at the post office: pacts don't come - or all of them at once

Chaos at the Deutsche Post in Penzberg: some people have had their letters and parcels delivered quite irregularly recently.

In view of the approaching Christmas party, those affected are tormented by the worrying question: Are gifts ordered on the Internet even delivered in time for the festival?

Penzberg

- One of those who recently only received letters and parcels from their postman sporadically is Michael Haas. "I have been observing for a long time that I get very irregular mail and if so, then in concentrated form," criticized the Penzberger in an email to the local newspaper in which he pointed out the grievances. Conversations with acquaintances would have shown that this problem apparently some people in different urban areas of Penzberg, writes Haas. Many of them had recently received their letters and parcels only irregularly.

According to reports, delivery districts are said to have been enlarged in the course of the construction of the new delivery base of the Deutsche Post in Habach.

In addition, there are said to be far too few employees at the Habach base.

And among them, to make matters worse, there is currently a high level of sick leave, which is causing the mountain of undelivered mail to continue to grow.

Most recently, we heard from a kind of DHL special task force that is said to have been canceled especially for the Habach distribution center in order to process and deliver the mountains of unfinished mail.

Massively strengthened staff

Dieter Nawrath from the press office of the Deutsche Post DHL Group in Munich confirmed that there were problems with the mail delivery when asked. "Unfortunately there have been delivery delays in the Penzberg area and parts of Murnau in the past few weeks," said Nawrath, emphasizing: "We apologize for the inconvenience." All shipments - letters, parcels and parcels - have now been processed. "There shouldn't be any further delays in delivery in the future."

It is correct, so Nawrath further, that his company temporarily "massively increased" the staff at the delivery base in Habach for this processing last week as well as at the beginning of this week in order to "serve the customers as quickly as possible".

The company continues to work “at full speed in all relevant areas” - for example when hiring staff - in order to avoid delays in the future.

Nawrath did not want to comment on a possible high level of sick leave among employees in Habach.

Rumors of computer turning off

As the press spokesman said at the end of October, 105 people were employed at the Habach delivery base at the time.

Even then, Nawrath had emphasized that Deutsche Post was looking for additional staff for this location (we reported).

According to reports, the deliverers also have to have a computer with them, in which they have to enter the parcels delivered.

The computer should also give the delivery staff exactly the break times or switch itself off automatically after eight hours - regardless of whether the parcels and letters to be delivered have been delivered or not.

Delivery districts are measured again and again

Nawrath confirms that it is correct that the deliverers are equipped with a so-called hand scanner for delivering parcels.

These devices are a help for the deliverer.

The recording of the delivered items ensures, among other things, that the deliverers are not overloaded.

But: "There is no automatic shutdown after eight hours," says Nawrath.

As for the delivery districts, they would all be checked regularly.

Among other things, this is necessary for economic reasons.

Basically, the districts are dimensioned in such a way that they can be handled by the deliverers within the working hours regulated by the collective agreement, according to Nawrath.

The size of the districts depends, among other things, on the number of mail items and on structural and geographical parameters;

for example household density.

“The result of a new dimensioning can be the re-cutting and thus a larger or smaller delivery district that a delivery person has to serve.” Among other things, this results in different delivery times for customers than before.

"That means that the deliverer can now come earlier than usual, but also later than usual."