letters
Postal service makes urgent mail more expensive
If a letter needs to arrive the next day, the sender will have to dig a little deeper into his pockets. Because the priority letter is no longer applicable. But there is an alternative.
If you are in a hurry when sending letters, you will have to send a registered letter in Germany from next year. The so-called Priority letter will be discontinued at the end of 2024, Deutsche Post announced. Instead, more expensive registered mail should enable a shipment to arrive particularly quickly.
With a priority letter, you pay an additional charge of 1.10 euros over normal postage and in return you receive the assurance that it is “more likely” to arrive on the next working day. The Prio letter is a niche, it was never a big success. The postal service justified the product discontinuation by saying that “letters no longer have the same urgency as they did 20 years ago, when there was not yet widespread competition from electronic media.”
Normal letters will take longer to travel
The reform of the postal law also plays a role, which will take effect at the beginning of 2025: VAT would then be due for priority letters, but this is not the case for registered mail. Despite this tax aspect, the discontinuation of the Priority letter is a surprise. The postal law reform is actually a tailwind for fast delivery services.
So far, the advantage of the priority letter has only been small because normal shipping is usually quick anyway: according to a government regulation, 80 percent of the letters posted today must be there on the next working day. The postal service exceeds this value. Most standard letters that cost 85 cents are delivered the next day – even without a priority surcharge. That will change: in 2025, the time pressure for the postal service will be reduced, and the majority of letters will only have to arrive after three days.
Prices for urgent letters are significantly higher than normal shipments
In principle, the new postal law would make the priority letter more attractive for customers. By slowing down the delivery of normal letters, the Priority letter would have clear added value as a special product with fast delivery: recipients would have it the next day and not just in three days, as the new regulation stipulates. Nevertheless, the end comes.
Anyone who has an urgent letter in the future must send a registered letter. This will be “the product for faster letter delivery,” according to the post office. It will be more expensive for the consumer: the price surcharge for a registered letter is currently 2.35 euros, around twice as much as for a priority letter. A standard letter sent as a registered letter currently costs 3.20 euros. If it is sent as a priority letter, it costs 1.95 euros. It is still unclear how expensive registered mail will cost in 2025.
dpa
Source: Stern
