Anger at increase in price of stamp to €1
Loss-making An Post ‘needs money to keep going’
AN POST is to hike the price a basic stamp from 72c to €1 in a move that has sparked widespread anger.
It also comes amid fears that the company plans to close up to 80 post offices in a reorganisation.
The postal service said the 39% price increase – revealed by the Irish Daily Mail last December, and announced after price controls were lifted – was necessary to fund An Post properly.
But the rise was attacked by the Consumers’ Association of Ireland, which said the service was not good enough. CAI chief executive Dermott Jewell said: ‘Why is it that every consumer of the service has to be the one who has to bail it out?
‘Do we have a 100% next-day delivery? No. And do we have weekend delivery, which is the case in other jurisdictions? Right now we don’t have enough alternatives to make this in anyway palatable.’
A Bill to strip postal service regulator ComReg of responsibility for overseeing postal rates was passed on Tuesday and the stamp price rise was announced yesterday. The date of the rise has yet to be confirmed.
A ComReg source said: ‘The price increase mechanism that did exist in the past, where we were consulted, no longer applies.’ And Mr Jewell added: ‘We have no control whatsoever over what we pay and we have lost control over the quality of the service.’
The 28c increase in the price of a basic stamp comes as the amount of mail An Post handles has plunged by almost half.
An Post has blamed the drop in the number of letters people post on the rise of email.
The company lost up to €15million last year and even higher losses are expected in 2017.
An Post said the price rise was needed to ‘continue to meet its Universal Service Obligation, delivering mail to every house in the State every weekday for a uniform price’.
An Post chief executive David McRedmond told RTÉ Radio how stamp prices have been kept ‘artificially low’ in Ireland
An Post had to be properly funded, he said. Mr McRedmond added that the service has one of the highest quality ratings in Europe and the best next-day service in Europe. But regarding the post office network, he could not say how many branches were under threat. He said: ‘There is no point in having a post office that was not in walking distance of anywhere.’
Lisa Chambers, Fianna Fáil TD for Mayo, expressed concern about the future of the rural post office, saying: ‘In recent days, we have begun to hear hints of what the Bobby Kerr report – the report that will shape Government policy on the future of the An Post network – is going to recommend.
‘For rural Ireland in particular, the report is not looking good. With a potential closure of at least 80 post offices... many communities across the country are worried about their futures.’
‘Why do we have to bail out the firm?’