South African Post Office International Mail Fiasco Not As Bad As It Looks

Although there IS a lot of mail at Johannesburg’s International Mail Centre, it is NOT as bad as it looks, according to the South African Post Office (SAPO)… and it should all be cleared by the end of November.

For a start, the photos currently being spread on social media are old, probably taken during the July strike, says SAPO. In fact – they’re even older than that! As seen in the screenshot below – the photos originate from 2015.

With Christmas approaching, and several South African expats contacting SAPeople over the past few weeks, concerned by rumours of a three-month backlog and damaged packages, we contacted SAPO to find out what’s really going on.

Sbu Xaba, acting head of SAPO’s Operations says: “The photos on Facebook show the Johannesburg International Mail Centre during a period when there was a considerable amount of mail waiting to be processed.

“The picture looks very different currently.” (UPDATE: View recent photos of the South African Post Office – taken 14 November 2018.)

According to Xaba, the Post Office has changed its sorting procedures to deal with the inflow of mail, which is now up to four times what it was a few years ago. (The increase in mail from abroad is partly due to South Africans buying goods abroad online because it’s cheaper. Registered mail is up 600%!)

• All mail that can be processed elsewhere is immediately moved to less busy mail centres to be processed, leaving the International Mail Centre free to process the items on hand.
• SAPO has also introduced weekend shifts.

Xaba says: “Thanks to these interventions, big international parcels, EMS and international letters are five days behind schedule – much better than before.

To clear the remaining backlog, SAPO:

• is implementing a remote customs declaration system which will expedite the clearance of parcels through customs. SAPO plans to implement this system before the end of the financial year.
• is putting plans in place to increase the number of processing staff at the international mail centre.
• has appointed a general manager specifically to optimise the sorting systems for
  international mail.

Xaba told SAPeople “It should be noted that the international sorting centre receives an average of 210,000 mail items per day.

“These items come into the sorting centre 24 hours a day, as aeroplanes land and offload freight around the clock.

“When the work day starts at the mail centre, there always mail on hand ready to be sorted.”

According to SAPO CEO Mark Barnes the domestic mailing backlog has been vastly improved, while the international backlog has been reduced to 7.8 million items compared to the 46 million that were stacked up in April.

Barnes, who has thrown his weight behind saving the Post Office, said: “We are finding ourselves, 20 years behind, getting into a postal service that is a modern digitised, efficient e-commerce driven world and we are just starting that catch-up.”

The Post Office aims to clear the backlog by the end of November. October to January are the busiest months because of the festive season. The R2.9 billion allocated in the adjustment budget last week will help the PO invest in infrastructure to make the sorting of post more efficient, Barnes told local media.

In the meantime, if you’re a South African abroad wanting to send Christmas packages home – you could use one of these: Alternatives and options for sending post and parcels to South Africa.