Too many Bpost letters arriving late, says regulator

Too many letters carried by Bpost fail to meet scheduled delivery times, according to a sample taken by the postal regulator, the Belgian Institute for Postal Services and Telecommunications (IBPT).

IBPT conducted a test on a sample of 1,200 letters: 400 priority letters, 400 non-priority letters and 400 condolence letters - a special priority service used to inform people quickly of a death - sent to 55 residential addresses.

“Certain quality targets were clearly not met during the test period,” IBPT found, going on to express “concern regarding Bpost’s adherence to delivery deadlines”.

For priority mail, a significant deviation from the next-day delivery target was observed: only 73.7% of priority mail was delivered the next day, instead of the expected 95%.

Even after accounting for the impact of several days of strike action, “priority mail, in particular, remains below expectations”, the regulator said.

For condolence letters, the target of 95% next-day delivery was almost met.

For non-priority mail, 85.7% of letters were delivered within three days, whereas the target is 95%.

Bpost said it had taken note of the figures and was committed to analysing the results carefully.

The postal company points out that a trade union demonstration took place during the test period, which influenced the results.

It emphasised that it was constantly implementing new measures to improve the quality of its services.