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15.05.2023
Damaged or non-existent letter-boxes, as well as freely roaming and unattended dogs make it difficult for postmen to fulfil their obligations in a quality manner when delivering items. Latvijas Pasts data show that around 180,000 locations in May 2023 cannot provide for secure delivery of items or cannot ensure delivery of items at all due to the lack of a letter-box, its technical damage or other reasons. In 2022, five employees of the company suffered from aggressive pets, and in the first four months of 2023, six attacks have already been recorded. Latvijas Pasts calls on residents to fix their letter-boxes and keep an eye on their guard dogs in order to enable postmen to ensure the proper delivery of items.
A properly functioning letter-box is an essential prerequisite for high-quality and fast delivery of postal items. Latvijas Pasts has observed that the delivery of items is significantly delayed and hampered by damaged or missing letter-boxes. This is confirmed by the statistics of the register of addresses of Latvijas Pasts: out of 1.24 million addresses, more than 16,500 addresses throughout Latvia have letter-boxes that are technically damaged, inappropriately sized or incorrectly placed, while at more than 163,000 locations letter-boxes are non-existent.
Therefore, Latvijas Pasts urges all customers to check the technical condition of their letter-boxes and to take the necessary measures so that their letter-boxes are in good working order and can perform their basic function – dropping items safely.
Inadequate condition of letter-boxes can be seen in almost every residential area throughout Latvia. Although this problem is prevalent mainly in cities – both in apartment blocks and detached houses – also customers living in rural areas have not always taken care of providing an appropriate letter-box for receiving the items addressed to them. Non-existent or inappropriate letter-boxes are also often found in horticultural co-operative societies, as well as on the buildings of legal entities and even public institutions.
The largest number of facts regarding non-compliant and absent letter-boxes is recorded in the Riga region: Riga, Ķekava Municipality, Ropaži Municipality and Olaine Municipality. Similarly, this problem is regularly detected elsewhere in Latvia, most often in Daugavpils, Rēzekne Municipality and Krāslava Municipality in the Latgale region; Tukums, South Kurzeme Municipality, Saldus Municipality and Ventspils Municipality in the Kurzeme region; and Iecava and Vecumnieki in the Zemgale region.
Latvijas Pasts would like to remind you that the postal operator is entitled not to deliver postal items, but to issue them on request at the post office to the addressees who have not placed and arranged their letter-boxes in accordance with the requirements of Cabinet’s Regulations No. 463 Regarding the Place of Provision of Postal Services, the Postal Network Access Point, the Letter-box Station and Letter-box Installation, the Placement and Designing of Letter-boxes, as well as the Arrangement of Stations of Processing of Cross-border Postal Items. According to these Cabinet’s Regulations, letter-boxes must be positioned in a safe place which is freely accessible to the postman.
At the same time, the performance of the postmen’s duties is often hindered by freely roaming and unattended dogs. In 2022, five postmen suffered from aggressive pets, and in the first months of 2023, six attacks have already been recorded. If a pet is aggressive, the health of postmen is seriously endangered, but those living at the address may not receive the items addressed to them, because postal workers do not have to risk their health trying to deliver the items in an unsafe environment.
Postmen most frequently have to be confronted with the following situations: a four-legged pet is left outdoors unattended for an extended period of time, preventing access to letter-boxes and dropping items in them; dog owners put their animals on a long chain, which allows them to reach the postman, owners leave a dog in the yard with a fence which is so low that the dog can easily jump over it or position the letter-box in such a place that the dog gets in the way and prevents the postman from dropping the items in the letter-box. Letter-boxes are often attached to the inside of the fence while there is an angry dog in the yard. There are dog owners who wrongly believe that their dog is friendly and will not harm the postman, but in reality the dog can become very aggressive as soon as a stranger wants to enter its territory.
In order to ensure the successful and safe delivery of postal items, Latvijas Pasts calls on residents to pay attention to the condition of the letter-boxes belonging to them, making sure that they are not damaged and are lockable, that they clearly indicate the address, apartment number or house name, surname or legal entity name and that the letter-box is located in an accessible place and has a size appropriate for the items to be received. Also, the employees of Latvijas Pasts ask dog owners to keep an eye on their four-legged house guards and take the necessary welfare measures.
The photos taken by Latvijas Pasts postmen showing dangerous guard dogs and letter-boxes which are damaged and not positioned according to the regulations can be viewed here.
About SJSC Latvijas Pasts
Latvijas Pasts ensures the widest availability of postal services throughout Latvia by maintaining more than 600 post offices and an extensive network of indoor and outdoor parcel lockers. The primary function of the company is provision of the universal postal service; Latvijas Pasts also provides commercial transport, express mail, parcel locker, payment, press subscription, retail and philatelic services. Latvijas Pasts is a wholly State-owned company with around 2,700 employees. The quality measurements of Latvijas Pasts domestic mail deliveries are regularly conducted by Kantar TNS, one of the leading market, social and media research agencies in Latvia. In turn, the quality measurements of the cross-border deliveries are provided within the framework of the International Post Corporation through the intermediary of the research companies Kantar TNS, Ipsos and Quotas.
Additional information:
Vineta Kļaviņa | Senior Public Relations Project Manager
E-mail: pr@pasts.lv
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