SA Post Office Strike

No luck. The local chimps don't want to answer the phones. Did any one manage to phone the above numbers. Tried at least 10 times today to both numbers, but nothing.
 
Space_Chief said:
In transit 2014/09/23 13:20 CAPEMAIL (HUB)

My USPS Priority Mail item is now in transit which means it's on the way to the local post office. I have some EMS items which will be shipped out in Japan in early October, the company only does EMS and in typical Japanese business way don't negotiate with customers, so we'll see how fast that goes.
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My parcel is from Japan as well. Item was shipped on 05.09. 12.09 was scanned in JHB and since then has not moved one bit. It says it is in transit since 17.09. My other concern is that I've got "only" 45 days to report if it is a problem. Which for African time is obviously not enough, but it is difficult to explain to Japanese guys or whatever that you need 3 months to get your stuff if you are lucky and that there are strikes most of the time.
 
Thank you for your patience.

All of our agents are still busy.

Your call is important to us.

Please be patient.

We will endeavour to answer your call as soon as possible.
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:(
 
I have a small fortune stuck in the post office. Nothing tracks past my local post office and when they are not closed they tell me the parcels isn't at the post office anymore....

Calling their call centre is a no go because when you get through they will just tell you to wait.

I am really concerned that this strike might make the post office fold. I wonder if we will ever see your items if that happens...
 
Yup, strike still on at SAPO. Got am e-mail that my stuff will be delayed...shyte.
 
Sucks. Needed stuff by next Friday but with this going on will have to make do with what I have. I thought we are supposed to be heading towards another Zimbabwe but Zim's post seems to at least be moving.
 
Luckily all my recent parcels came from DHL and I didn't even pay a lot for shipping(less than R150 per parcel).
I ordered 3 parcels from different shops on different dates and received all 3 parcels at once after 6 days from China.(Would have been faster if they won't looking for black market Iphones and counterfeit dollars, that I read in some news articles that delayed shipping)
If only the postal service was this efficient.
 
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So why can't SAPO hire temps in their place? No work no pay right? So just someone else to do the job?
 
Heard on the news last night that there are roumors that SAPO is bankcrupt. They couldnt pay there staff yesterday.
 
Drifter said:
Heard on the news last night that there are roumors that SAPO is bankcrupt. They couldnt pay there staff yesterday.
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Yes, having worked for them they started to pay debt late since end of last year. It started to get worse and worse (later and later payments), I stopped working for them as each payment slipped more and more each month (last I heard payments due on 1st were only being paid two to three weeks later)
 
Yip I stopped working for them last year May and I haven't looked back, Had a retail postal agency and openly posted information regarding their tactics on facebook, they pay retail agencies as little as R500 a month, no rental and very little commission on each parcel delivered, it means you can have a fully fledged post office at under a R1000.00 if you include commission earned ect.

Bargain for the post office, however most often these retail agencies have to fend for them selves as there is no support structure in place, for the better part of 2012 there was no CEO, CFO, COO and pretty much every other C you can think of.

Personnel get promoted so often, that at least every year there is a new retail manager of sorts, and have to start all over again to get a working relationship build and list concerns and undressed issues and mess the previous one left.Eventually I just gave up gave them notice and moved on.However they failed to collect their equipment, for nearly 6 months after the post office closed down and resulted in me sending them a storage bill after having informed them that via registered letters that they need to collect their stuff or else a R15 per item per day storage fee will be applicable.

They ignored those letters and eventually left with a R4500.00 bill to settle before I would release the equipment.They eventually paid and collected the items.

They still have a 1.25 ton safe here that they needed to collect well over a year now, and a storage bill of R7650.00, send 3 register letters should the safe not be collected, within x amount of days, I will claim legal ownership of the safe.Well they ignored those too, so I am a proud new owner of a Cat 3 safe ;)

They still more than welcome to collect when they settle the storage bill ;)

That is just one side of their expenditure that is leading to their financial ruin.
 
According to The Sunday Times, the post office has been hit by five major strikes in the last three years, costing the organisation over R100 million. This breakdown in employee relations is causing the Post Office to lose customers fast, having a negative impact on business as their latest financial year shows they experienced a R359-million loss.

Speaking to Fin24.com recently, Post Office Chief Operating Officer Mlu Mathonsi said their management has been involved in fruitful discussions with union leaders from three trade unions in attempts to bring the persistent strikes to an end.
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http://www.destinyconnect.com/2014/09/25/no-end-to-post-office-strike/
 
bavmorda said:
My parcel is from Japan as well. Item was shipped on 05.09. 12.09 was scanned in JHB and since then has not moved one bit. It says it is in transit since 17.09. My other concern is that I've got "only" 45 days to report if it is a problem. Which for African time is obviously not enough, but it is difficult to explain to Japanese guys or whatever that you need 3 months to get your stuff if you are lucky and that there are strikes most of the time.
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Was your item EMS?

South Koreans are the worst. They don't even do EMS deliveries to SA. It gets re-routed by UPS or TNT.
 
lived666 said:
How is that the worst?
Anyone avoiding EMS and SAPO is doing the right thing?
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It is because EMS is a very safe way to get your stuff here and also to send it out. I've sent stuff by EMS to places like India and it arrived safely. I also don't have problems with EMS deliveries. They're very fast and very cheap. If Japanese and Americans can send by EMS there is no reason Koreans should not respect it for SA. Courier shipping is usually 50-100% more expensive. In addition EMS does not charge customs brokerage fees. In addition sometimes customs don't charge duties or VAT but courier stuff most likely will attract duties.

If I added up all the money I spent in using postal services and not using greedy scumbag couriers in the last 15 years I think it would be R400K at least. In the last 15 years I received about 150-200 EMS items. Of those I did not lose any and have not had any damages. Most - that's like 90% arrived within 4-5 business days. Heck sometimes it took 3 business days. Your Tokyo posted EMS item on Monday arrived at your door on Thursday, same week.

As said this is the first time a strike may slow EMS deliveries.

If you're someone who only buys one or two things per year, or you have a lot of cash to waste, by all means go with couriers. Note that getting insurance back from couriers can be a PITA as well. And not all courier shipping offers insurance. I'm happy with EMS, barring huge strikes like this one.

Just to add, I've lost very few airmail and SAL parcels too. I think in the last 15 years I lost 3-4 items out of a 500+ sent by post.
 
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According to an article in the Pretoria News today, the Post Office has renaged on several agreements with the workers dating back to February when an agreement was agreed at the CCMA.

Time to fire some Managers at the Post Office.
 
Billy said:
According to an article in the Pretoria News today, the Post Office has renaged on several agreements with the workers dating back to February when an agreement was agreed at the CCMA.

Time to fire some Managers at the Post Office.
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Oh yeah. They need to clean up their act fast. A strike like this is hurting our rep, as bad as our rep is already.

And I don't think the post office will be done away with. It would look very bad in the outside world, that Zim can have a functional post office, but member of BRICS, South Africa, cannot afford one. (And no local company, ala DHL in Germany, will take over).
 
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