Multi-task postmen do more than mail
La Poste has announced plans to branch out into a whole new range of home services
NEXT time your local postman calls at your house, they could bring library books, medicine and groceries as well as mail – and read your gas and electricity meters on the way out.
La Poste has announced plans to branch out into a whole new range of home services to compensate for a decline in the number of letters. It wants to capitalise on postmen’s “very positive image”.
Experiments have already been carried out on a regional basis. In Brittany, 450 posties were trained to install digital TV set-top boxes for the elderly.
In the Ile-de-France, postmen work with pharmacies to deliver medicines to people who have transport difficulties. The scheme will now be extended nationwide.
Other ideas include a partnership with local councils to check on the ill or elderly, collect library books and carry out meter readings on behalf of gas and electricity suppliers.
The service will be called “Bonjour, facteur!” (Good morning, postman!) and will be offered regardless of whether the person has any post that day.
New technologies have led to less and less use of traditional letters. La Poste is expecting its overall contribution to its revenues to fall by a further 30 per cent over the next five years.
The firm also, in theory, faces new competition from next January, when its monopoly on light letters is to end.
