Australia
Start date: 28 January 2022
End date: ongoing
Incident: weather issues
The designated operator of Australia, Australia Post, had informed that its daily operations are currently suffering disruption because of severe storms and flooding across the country, and especially in the states of South Australia and Queensland and the Northern Territory. The processing and delivery of inbound and outbound mail items is affected.
Deliveries in Queensland to postcode areas 4731, 4805 and 4820 (flooded roads), and areas 4804 to 4852 (road closures) are especially impacted.
Australia Post will continue to monitor the evolution of this situation and will provide an update once operations have returned to normal.
Germany
Start date: 27 January 2022
End date: ongoing
Incident: coronavirus
The designated operator of Germany, Deutsche Post, had informed us that, owing to a significant increase in the number of COVID-19 infections among its operational staff and in view of measures to limit the spread of the virus, delays are to be expected in the processing and delivery of inbound and outbound postal items.
Greece
Start date: 24 January 2022
End date: ongoing
Incident: heavy snowfalls
The designated operator of Greece, Hellenic Post had informed us that the whole country was hit by heavy snowfalls on the morning of Monday, 24 January 2022.
This has resulted in the closure of sorting centres, and collections and deliveries have been cancelled. The main highway connecting Athens and Thessaloniki is closed, along with many main roads in the Attica region. Numerous flights (domestic and international) to and from Athens International Airport are also cancelled.
According to the weather forecast, the situation is set to become even worse in the coming days. This will have a direct impact on all postal operations.
Italy - Update on IT issues
Start date: 1 July 2021
End date: ongoing
Incident: IT issues
Further to Incident Bulletin 20.12.2021, the designated operator of Italy, Poste Italiane had advised us that severe delays are still being experienced in processing postal items due to serious IT problems in Italian customs.
This is still affecting all postal shipments from outside the EU. Due to these technical issues once shipments arrive to Italy they currently face delays of at least several weeks before being processed by customs and delivered by Poste Italiane. We are receiving updates on the situation from Poste Italiane but they are still unable to give us a date when these issues will be resolved.
The latest update provided by Poste Italiane as per the below:
- The first problem mainly consists of the customs clearance IT system providing unexpected error message feedback over a vast number of items presented for clearance.
The situation has become progressively worse over the past few weeks, and the consequent increase in number of large backlogs has resulted in the agreement of different clearing processes with customs authorities. As a result of these new processes, all eligible traffic – i.e. items not stopped by customs authorities and with complete and accurate customs data – is immediately released for delivery. All other items, for which either full data entry or completion/ correction of the data is mandatory, continue to be subject to clearance delays.
We also regret to inform that the recent worsening of the COVID-19 situation in Italy, resulting in the daily absence of thousands of workers, has placed huge pressure on our operational networks. Nevertheless, we will make every possible effort to meet our targets.
- The second problem stems from various changes applied to logistics and custom clearance processes necessary to comply with new regulations. These have led to structural software adjustments to allow our systems to generate and transmit the expected tracking events. New system developments are required in turn (implying the support of our data transmission network providers) in order to ensure the accuracy of the newly created data flows.
Despite some delays in the rollout phase, since the second half of December 2021, the new systems and software are proving to be efficient. We have organized an ongoing recovery process for tracking events occurring over the last few weeks, which we estimate will be complete by the end of January 2022.
Finally, the misalignment between international tracking data and our internal systems has been solved.
Poste Italiane apologizes for these problems and will keep us updated on further developments as quickly as possible.
Morocco
Start date: 29 November 2021
End date: 26 January 2022
Incident: coronavirus
Further to Incident Bulletin 21.01.22, the designated operator of Morocco, Poste Maroc, wishes to inform that the processing and delivery of inbound and outbound postal items have resumed since 26 January 2022.
New Zealand
Start date: 23 January 2022
End date: ongoing
Incident: coronavirus
New Zealand Post had informed us that the Government of New Zealand has announced the application of the red setting of the “traffic lights” COVID-19 protection framework throughout the country, with effect from 23:59 local time on 23 January 2022.
This decision was made in view of the confirmation of nine cases of the Omicron variant in the Nelson/Tasman region, followed by several other cases throughout the country, indicating that the Omicron outbreak is continuing to spread.
As a business entity that provides essential services, New Zealand Post will continue to operate under the red setting. Physical distancing measures (i.e. split shifts and a 2-metre distance between staff members) apply at New Zealand Post’s operational sites, resulting in reduced capacity and a negative impact on operational performance in terms of processing, transport, sorting and delivery of mail.
With regard to customer service, the sending of CN 18 forms (Declaration concerning non-receipt (or receipt) of a postal item) and proof of delivery will be subject to significant delays, as New Zealand Post’s customer service agents will be working from home without access to certain office facilities (e.g. printers).
Poland
Start date: 28 January 2022
End date: ongoing
Incident: IT issues
Poczta Polska had informed us that today 28 January 2022 there was a problem with sending EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) messages to the IPS system for import and export mail.
The failure has been reported. The updates will follow once the issue is fixed.