PHOTOS: What the South African Post Office REALLY Looks Like Today

Following photos being shared wildly on social media in the past week or so, showing chaos at the Johannesburg International Mail Centre, the South African Post Office (SAPO) told SAPeople yesterday that the photos were old (they were in fact from 2015!) and that “the picture looks very different currently”. We asked the Post Office to show us by sending a photo… and they’ve gone one better by sending two (both shown on the right in the pictures below):

The Post Office kindly took these photos at the Joburg International Mail Centre on 14 November 2018, at around 14h00. At this time of day the Post Office has a relatively clear floor, with the lines of blue bags at the back ready to be loaded on trucks.

According to SAPO, they start the day with a floor full of mail (because the airlines offload freight throughout the night) and later in the afternoon (after 14h00), a second substantial dispatch comes in.

The mail centre has become busier over the past few years because of an immense rise in incoming international items, attributed to the rise in South Africans buying cheaper overseas products online.

According to a Post Office spokesperson the mail centre is expanding to a second building.

Several other plans are also currently being implemented by the South African Post Office – including extra staff, weekend shifts and a remote customs declaration system – to resolve the backlog of international items at the Centre, caused largely by a strike in July.

The Post Office expects to have it all cleared by the end of November, in time for Christmas.

Details on SAPO’s international parcel service here.