SA Post Office CEO
A hurried interview with the chief of the SA Post Office in the wake of Amazon.com’s startling decision to dump them does not inspire much confidence.
The giant online book retailer announced this week that so many of the books they sent through South Africa’s postal service were stolen that they had decided to use a private courier service instead.
South Africa thus became the only country on the continent whose postal service Amazon refuses to touch.
CEO Motshoanetsi Lefoka, the third person to hold this seemingly unhappy position in five years, does not sound particularly fazed.
She says she had “no inkling” that Amazon had problems with the service they were getting. An indication of just how out of touch the Post Office is with its customers is the fact that a South African financial daily newspaper knew about Amazon’s decision before she did.
Instead of sounding embarrassed by this, Lefoka makes it sound like the Post Office, and not the aggrieved customer, is the injured party. This doesn’t stop her waxing lyrical about the importance the Post Office attaches to customer relations.
By the time I speak to her late on Thursday, at least 24 hours after the news broke, she has still not spoken to anybody from Amazon. She is, she says, “looking for the right people to talk to”.
Her office managed to find someone at the Amazon call centre but, “they could not add any further light to us in terms of the issues”.
The Post Office has never dealt directly with Amazon, she says. It deals with the US Postal Service because, strictly speaking, Amazon is their client and not a client of the SA Post Office.
She has approached the US Postal Service to ask: “Are there issues that we need to sit down and discuss about Amazon.com?”
She cannot say how much the loss of Amazon’s business will cost the Post Office. “It will have an impact,” she concedes grudgingly, but it won’t be that much.
What about the impact on the Post Office’s reputation?
“The impact on our reputation is quite high,” she acknowledges in a voice that doesn’t reflect any undue sense of concern, let alone urgency.
Is the Post Office concerned about this?
“Yes. We cannot afford to have this measure of impact on our reputation.”
What is she going to do about it?
“We need to look at this problem holistically.”
As with her predecessors, she knows the jargon and has read many of the right books. Indeed, she is currently reading In Pursuit of Excellence by some American management guru.
Five years ago, Maanda Manyatshe was lecturing me on the need to look at the problems of the Post Office “holistically”.
When he was shown the door, successor Khutso Mampeule made equally impressive noises about tackling problems “holistically”.
Now it is Lefoka’s turn. She has been the de facto CEO of the Post Office for 18 months. Before that she was the chief operating officer, and before that the executive in charge of mail.
And still she’s saying things like, “We need to look at this problem holistically”.
Surely she knows what the problem is by now? I ask. It’s theft.
It’s not that simple, she says. “Let me just explain something to you.”
But it is that simple. Amazon will no longer use the Post Office because their parcels are being stolen.
“I’m sorry to say that I don’t have a statement from Amazon.com that says because of theft in the SA Post Office we are not doing this,” she says petulantly.
When Amazon ships books to South Africa, there are different people they utilise. Lefoka gives a complicated explanation of the mechanics involved in getting a book from the US to an address in South Africa. The gist is that the SA Post Office is only one link in the chain and so it is premature to make accusations.
“As I stand here, I cannot say Amazon.com has said a, b, c or d.”
Doesn’t she read the newspapers?
They are “still trying to verify” media reports, she says.
What about all the anecdotal evidence, such as letters to newspaper editors from people who never get their parcels?
“What I would like to advise people to do is …” She talks about call centres and tracking numbers and how customers can help the Post Office “get to the root of the problem”.
Now she’s passing the buck to her customers?
“No. If we have lost parcels, we will take responsibility.”
Does she at least acknowledge that theft remains a serious problem for the SA Post Office?
“For postal operators worldwide, theft remains a problem.”
But only the SA Post Office has been dumped by Amazon?
“Like I said, I am still waiting for Amazon.com to say that the SA Post Office is the one that has caused the problems that they have.”
Does the SA Post Office ever contact major clients to ask if they’re happy with the service?
“We will be conducting surveys this year to make sure that we do get feedback directly from the clients.”
Why not before?
“Let me explain the structures …”
The SA Post Office, like the Airports Company of SA, like South African Airways, like Eskom, has structures, processes and good intentions aplenty. Lefoka doesn’t tell me anything that her predecessors didn’t.
And of course it is not only Amazon. She admits that the Post Office is currently addressing complaints from Britain’s Royal Mail that customers in South Africa are not receiving their parcels.
Even the dire Department of Home Affairs has complained to parliament about poor service from the SA Post Office.
She denies media reports that the Department of Home Affairs had done an Amazon on them. “Together with Home Affairs we are reviewing our processes.”
To give an idea of how serious the Post Office is about theft, Lefoka tells me that “all Post Office employees know that it is a dismissible offence”.
But she can’t say how many have been fired for theft. She can’t even give a rough estimate. She likes the word “accountability”. Everybody is accountable. She is accountable and her managers are accountable. How many have been fired for non-performance, then?
“I’ll have to come back to you.”
Like her predecessors, she is keen to trot off statistics (she even has a degree in statistics) showing how many new addresses the Post Office has created in rural areas.
What about stories of mail and parcels being dumped on the side of the road in these rural areas?
“Mail dumping is one of the things we are looking at.”
It, too, is “a dismissible offence”. But she can’t say if a single manager has been fired for it.
Soweto-born Lefoka, 44, has a degree in statistics from the University of Botswana and trained as an industrial engineer at a university in North Carolina in the US. After a spell in the private sector, she joined the Department of Public Works.
She is on a five-year contract as Post Office CEO, but so were her predecessors. During their short-lived stints, they were victims of boardroom politics rather than any Amazon-like fiascos.
She has no intention of offering to resign and is confident that she will serve out her term.
She gets on “very, very well” with the board, she says.
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