When Swiss Post CEO Robert Cirillo announced on Wednesday plans to cut a fifth of post offices across Switzerland by 2028, the reaction from some politicians and civil society groups was swift. “With its plans, it is carrying out a clearcutting in this area [postal service] and dealing a severe blow to the public service,” Manuel Wyss from the communications trade union Syndicom told External link Swiss public television, SRF. Check out our selection of newsletters.
Subscribe here . In many ways, the decision to eliminate 170 post offices didn’t come as a surprise. Fewer people are sending letters, and even when they do, they rarely use a physical post office to do it or to buy stamps or carry out financial transactions.
The number of post offices has been on the decline for decades with the rise of email, smartphones and e-banking. There were around 4,100 post offices in Switzerland in the 1970s compared to around 800 at the turn of the century. Covid only accelerated the shift online.
The latest announcement on Wednesday means there would be 600 post offices across Switzerland by 2028. Switzerland is far from alone. The Universal Postal Union reported last year that revenue generated from letter-post services globally dropped External link from over 50% in 2005 to 34% in 2021.
By next year they expect that to drop to 29%. The financial squeeze has led many countries to cut back on physical post offices. For Switzerland, the demise of post offices is a bitter pill to s.
