In an age of growing e-commerce and increased internet-based communications, the local postal service, the Guyana Post Office Corporation (GPOC), remains a vital institution serving communities across the country, no matter how small or remote. Many people still directly depend on the postal service almost every day and this reality demands that the postal service produces greater service efficiency and adopts a sustainable business model.
When most Guyanese think of traditional mail service, they probably think of utility bills, bank statements, sealed letters and postcards. However, the Guyana Telephone & Telegraph Company (GTT) has largely done away with the old-fashioned billing system and is now widening the acceptance of online billing among its customers; and this development is likely to be picked up by other companies. Most people hardly send out handwritten or typed correspondence these days, and as such this core business of the postal service must have declined significantly in the last decade, eroding revenue and weakening its ability to meet financial and other obligations.
This decline, which is expected to continue, is a structural shift towards the ever-advancing arena of electronic communication, where even the “email” is now considered old fashioned, as social media platforms like WhatsApp and Facebook now all have built-in messenging functionality. The GPOC’s ability to make the appropriate adaptations appears limited in the absence of a reorganisation plan driven by innovation and a focus on operational improvements.
On the operational side, the postal service continues to service the citizens using basic delivery methods including workers walking from house-to-house in some areas. Rates are moderate, human resources are limited, and many households are without mailboxes. Recently, the GPOC announced that its sensitisation campaign to gift 100 mailboxes to households was continuing with the presentation of boxes to three homeowners. A release from the Department of Public Information stated that, “a large volume of mail is often returned to the post offices across the country because of the absence of mailboxes.”
Local suppliers in the mailbox business are now being encouraged to work with the service by supplying GPOC with mailboxes to roll out to more citizens. It would be interesting to learn about GPOC’s own supply chain in this regard and its past approach to achieving this specific business objective.
Minister of Public Telecommunications, Cathy Hughes, who has responsibility for the GPOC, spoke of transformation in the service and plans to restructure and redesign the postal service in 2017. At the time, she had noted that 53 post offices were ICT ready and government was working to meet the modern day needs of customers.
Post offices in Buxton, Charlestown, and Soesdyke (Region 4); Sisters Village (Region 6); and Danielstown (Region 2) were also identified for rehabilitation works in 2018. The new buildings, Hughes said, will be equipped with electronic security systems, Wi-Fi, air conditioning and accommodations for the sick and elderly.
Minister Hughes also referred to the challenges facing the postal services saying that reforms were long overdue. The challenges in themselves are as old as some of the decrepit buildings still operational and functioning within the system but are also not unique to Guyana.
Over in the United States, the Trump administration has called for reforms to the postal service to create a more sustainable business model but has also faced opposition for a proposal to privatize the service. The White House made the proposal in a wide-ranging plan to reorganize the federal government. Privatizing the postal service was among 32 distinct ideas it said would help agencies run more efficiently.
Opponents of the US privatisation plan including Senator Bernie Sanders have advocated for the removal of burdens and barriers that prevent the service from being more entrepreneurial. Sanders has released a plan which supports permitting the postal service to develop new consumer products and services, noting that “currently, it is against the law for workers in the post offices to make copies of documents”.
Saunders’ plan while emphasising the need for a new business model, at its core, is about saving a crucial service and about saving jobs for millions of workers. Here at home, government has an equally important responsibility to ensure that the postal service stabilises its operations ensuring financial viability, adapting to changing customer needs without resulting in widescale job losses for postal workers.
The announcement that some post offices are ICT ready must be supported by hard evidence that infrastructure has been upgraded, human resources have been upskilled to cope with the changing customer needs and a greater focus on security of its operations including the elimination of illegal transactions that continue to plague the service.
At this stage, government and GPOC should have had a solid framework for sustaining the operations in place which includes reducing service costs, generating new business streams and adjusting prices to reflect a changed and improved business model.
Hughes’ ministry reportedly has plans to demolish all derelict post offices and to replace them with new, computerised, energy-efficient buildings with “proper staff and customer accommodation.” This will require a sizeable budgetary commitment, and on the more challenging side, a commitment to pursue a culture of innovation and service improvement.
To her credit Minister Hughes has acknowledged there is little rationale to the current operating structure of the postal service. The value of a postal network is related to the number of addresses served, and it this understanding which will ultimately save the business, as no other delivery network in Guyana can match the reach of the GPOC.
The GPOC has the competitive advantages of ubiquity of coverage and uniformity of price, and must include the new measures to reduce returned mail and improve service quality. Additionally, in this age of online shopping and specialised procurement methods, upgrading its package delivery and tracking capability in concert with a modern information technology system, can facilitate growth in its Business-to-Business and Business-to-Customer niches and pave the way for a modernized GPOC’s return to financial viability.