Iran Post Company has added 400 pickup trucks and 40 trucks to its fleet.
Alireza Zargoush, a member of the board at Iran Post Company, told IRNA that the addition of vehicles has expanded the country’s postal capacity by 100%, adding that the capacity to deliver packages between different cities has now risen by 30% to reach 200,000 tons per year.
“To accelerate our services, we have signed a contract with a knowledge-based company to launch a new mechanized sorting center in Tehran. A total of 500 billion rials [$2 million] will be invested in this project,” he added.
ICT Minister Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi says after the outbreak of Covid-19, requests for postal services experienced an upsurge, therefore, there was a need to expand facilities to meet this new demand.
“All the added vehicles were manufactured by domestic automakers and were tailor-made to meet the requirements of Iran Post Company,” he said.
Ramezanali Sobhanifar, the head of government-owned Iran Post Company, said recently that 2,000 billion rials ($9 million) have been invested in improving postal services such as purchasing trucks, vans and mail-sorting machines over the past five months.
“Safekeeping of people’s possessions and speedy delivery of parcels are two main goals of Iran Post Company. To achieve these goals, the company has purchased 4,000 drop boxes to keep parcels safe from damage during transit. These boxes will be added to the postal service by May 21,” he was quoted as saying by IRNA.
“The expansion of mechanical mail-sorting centers is on the agenda of the Ministry of Information and Communications Technologies; one such center was inaugurated by the ICT minister recently and another will be opened in Isfahan and other cities in the next couple of months,” he added.
With the increased reliance on online shopping during the time of coronavirus, a flood of packages is testing the capabilities of Iran Post Company – the entity responsible for providing postal services in Iran.
“Postal exchanges increased by 82% in the eight months to Nov. 20 compared with the corresponding period of the year before,” Fariba Moradi, a senior official with company, said in December.
“A total of 141 million packages were delivered during the period. Furthermore, 50 tons of packages are delivered via rail on a daily basis. The company has added electric motorcycles and roofed delivery vehicles to its logistical facilities,” she was quoted as saying by the news portal of the ICT Ministry.
“In the fiscal 2019-20, the sorting and distribution department of Iran Post Company delivered 170 tons of packages on peak days but the volume of packages has now increased sevenfold to 700 tons per day,” Mehdi Maqsoudi, another official with the state-owned corporation, said.
He noted that the number of small packages increased from 120,000 in the fiscal 2019-20 to 350,000 per day.
Asked about recent complaints voiced on social media over customers’ frustration vis-à-vis delays, the official said, “The Post Company is experiencing a surge of package volume due to e-commerce growth ... The closure of most businesses … has led to an unprecedented demand and some temporary service delays for some packages.”
Sobhanifar said Iran Post Company sends at least 5 tons of letters and packages overseas per day.
Today, e-commerce shipping services account for 30% of total delivery services offered by Iran Post Company, he added.
The IPO chief noted that in the past, parcels used to be transported to their destinations by vans or trucks, but now they are being shipped by rail.
“The company has yet to dedicate an exclusive train for this job, as it only charters wagons for transportation of packages and parcels. It is our hope to commit an exclusive airplane for delivery of packages with the help of other agencies. Mechanical mail sorting is also on our agenda for the near future. Metal boxes have been dedicated for carrying packages to prevent items’ loss or damage,” he was quoted as saying by IRNA.
Iran Post Company has 13,000 people on its payroll and over 20,000 indirect workers.
Each postman used to deliver 80 packages a day before the outbreak of the coronavirus but at present, they distribute 180 packages per day.
Work done by each postal worker prevents up to 1,000 unnecessary trips a day.
Post offices won’t be closed on holidays and will be offering services 24 hours, IRNA reported.
