Quality of universal postal service

The quality of the universal postal service includes providing:

that all legal or natural persons can send and receive mail at their home or premises at least five workdays per week, at least once per day,
a sufficient number of contact points and sufficiently long business hours for direct work with users of postal services,
a suitable number of mail boxes,
appropriate letter mail delivery times and
appropriate procedures for resolving complaints.

The quality of the universal postal service is defined in the General act on the quality of the universal postal service provision.

Delivery deadlines

In domestic postal traffic at least 95% of all letter mail must be transferred in one workday (D+1), at least 99.5% in two workdays (D+2), and 100% of letter mail within three workdays (D+3).

In postal traffic with European Union member states at least 85% of letter mail must be transferred within 3 workdays (D+3) and at least 97% of letter mail within five days (D+5).

In domestic postal traffic at least 80% of all parcels must be transferred in one workday (D+2), and 95% of parcels within three workdays (D+3).

The universal service provider must also provide measurements related to quality control for each calendar year. The Agency performs a supervision of the methodology and the results of quality measurements once per year.

The revised results of the quality of delivery for letter mail in domestic traffic of Pošta Slovenije, d.o.o., for 2018 were as follows:

95.7% of all letter mail was delivered in one day from the date of dispatch (D+1),
99.7% of all letter mail was delivered in two business days from the date of dispatch (D+2),
in three business days from the date of dispatch (D+3) 99.95% of all letter mail was delivered.

The figure comparing the movements of the quality of letter mail (D+1 and D+2) for the 2012 – 2018 period shows the required deadlines and how they are achieved.

Gibanje kakovosti prenosa poštnih pošiljk korespondence (D+1 in D+2) v obdobju 2012 – 2017

The revised 2018 results of the quality of delivery for parcels in domestic traffic of Pošta Slovenije, d.o.o., were as follows:

99.4% of all parcels were delivered in two business days from the date of dispatch (D+2),
in three business days from the date of dispatch (D+3) 99.8% of all parcels were delivered.

As the below figure comparing the movements of the quality of transfer of parcels for the 2012 – 2018 period shows, Pošta Slovenije, d.o.o., has been achieving a significantly higher quality than required in this area.

Gibanje kakovosti prenosa poštnih paketov v obdobju 2012 - 2017

Postal network density

The universal service provider must ensure at least one contact point, which should be organized as a post office or a contractual post office, in every municipality in the territory of the Republic of Slovenia. At the same time 95% of the population of the Republic of Slovenia should not have an longer areal distance to the nearest contact point than 4.5 kilometres. Considering the above criteria the population coverage of the Republic of Slovenia with contact points in 2019, when the General act on the quality of providing the universal service came into effect, stood at 96.74%. On 31 December 2019 the coverage reached 95.7%.

Since the amendments to the General act on the quality in 2017 were adopted, there has been an option for an exception that the universal postal service provider fulfils all their requirements regarding the number and dispersion of their contact points even when an individual municipality does not have a contact point that would be organized as a post office or a contractual post office, if there is another type of contact point organized instead. Still, the areal distance for 95% of the population of the Republic of Slovenia to the nearest post office or a contractual post office should not exceed 4.5 km.

The Agency must approve any transformation or closure of a contact point.

Working hours of contact points

In order to provide direct work with users of postal services, contact points must be open at least five workdays per week. Contact points that are organized as post offices or contractual post offices must be open at least 2 consecutive hours per workday, at least once per week in the afternoon after 4 PM. All other types of contact points must be open every workday for at least one hours per workday, at least once per week in the afternoon after 4 PM.

Any changes to working hours must be published at least 20 days before the change comes into effect.

Mailboxes

The provider of the universal postal service must install at least one mailbox per:

every 400 inhabitants in towns with up to 5,000 inhabitants,
every 700 inhabitants in towns with 5,001 to 25,000 inhabitants,
every 1,000 inhabitants in towns with 25,001 to 80,000 inhabitants,
every 1,300 inhabitants in cities with 80,001 to 250,000 inhabitants,
every 1,500 inhabitants in cities with 25,001 to 250,000 inhabitants.

Regardless of the above, the universal service provider may remove a mailbox if it establishes based on two 14-day uninterrupted counts within 3 months or more that the mailbox only has on average of less than 10 pieces of letter mail per day. This does not apply to towns with only one mailbox, and no contact point.

Regulator's intervention

If an inspector or an authorised person from the Agency establishes during a supervision procedure that a law, regulation, or an act over which it has authority has been breached, they have the right and the duty to:

issue a decree to remedy the breach within the deadline they set,
act as a minor offence body in accordance with the act that details minor offences, and recommend a minor offence procedure be launched,
issue a fine for the minor offence,
recommend the applicable body to adopt measures, and
temporarily forbid continued provision of the activity, if such is not provided in accordance with the law.

Foreign practices

The quality of postal services is an important part of the tasks of European regulatory bodies and all the organizations operating in the European postal services market. The most important studies related to the quality are published on the European Commission's website.

Studies and the results of the research done by regulatory bodies of EU member states are available on their websites.

Name	Purpose	Lifetime
_ga	Used to distinguish users.	2 years
_ga_container-id	Used to persist session state.	2 years