Court ruling severely restricts couriers

Parcels must be delivered in person Leonard Neill THE POSTAL Regulator has warned courier companies not to deposit small parcels into public post boxes or attempt to have them lodged into a private or company’s post box. Their duty is to deliver these person-to-person at the consignee’s address. This follows an appeal court ruling delivered in Pretoria last Friday involving an application by a Cape Town company, Interlink Postal Courier. Maanda Manyatshe, SA Post Office chief executive, told the court that many couriers wanted to operate only along lucrative routes, leaving the less attractive routes for the post office to service. He said the post office was not against competition, but wanted all participants to play by the rules. Judge Robin Marais, who heard the application, ruled that courier services were debasing the commonly understood concept of a courier service when ‘they merely pushed letters into a box to linger until someone happened to collect them.’ Interlink had claimed that courier services should not be limited to face-to-face deliveries, and should be allowed to deliver articles to post boxes. “All courier companies must also remember that we have the exclusive right to handle all packages under one kilogram in weight,” Postal Regulator Mickey Kutta told FTW. “The Post Office is the only company allowed to remove goods from the red boxes in the street and deliver them. This also applies to inserting mail into post boxes. A courier’s duty is to make door-to-door deliveries.” She confirmed that regulations governing the handling of items under one kilogram were ready to be gazetted and would become official within the next few weeks. Thereafter the Post Office would be the only authority permitted to handle parcels in this weight category.