IMDA vows to go after SingPost after serious service lapses

On Tuesday, January 29, Singapore’s Info-communications Media Development Authority (IMDA) vowed to take “firm action” against SingPost after a series of glaring lapses that have resulted in the arrest of one postman for reportedly throwing away undelivered mail, as well as disciplinary action for another postal worker who had lied about distributing flyers that a customer had paid a whopping S$ 7,000 for.

IMDA is vowing to go after SingPost for transgressions in its service standards and public postal license requirements.

The Authority has said that it has “grave concerns” because of the breaches in SingPost’s performance, and has said that “SingPost must investigate all complaints and feedback raised, and take urgent steps to improve its service standards and restore public confidence in its postal services.”

IMDA is now embarking on a probe into the incident of the postman throwing mail into the rubbish bin, something that the police is also separately looking into. This latest breach, which was reported also on Tuesday, January 29, affected the residents from Ang Mo Kio Ave 4 and 5.

Facebooker Alyce Kathleen, who lives in Ang Mo Kio, posted photos on January 28 of public garbage cans containing what seemed to be unopened letters and parcels. Some of the mail was official correspondence coming from the Land Transport Authority and the Ministry of Health’s Community Health Assist Scheme.

She wrote “This is why you will NEVER receive your mails and parcel from Singapore Post.

Postman actually threw the letters and parcel into the bins. This is not the first time we’ve found this in Ang Mo Kio.

LTA/CHAS government letters – unopened are all being dumped.”

https://www.facebook.com/alyce.kathlyn/posts/2091298334299109?__tn__=C-R

An article from Today reports that the Postal Services Act declares that it is an offense for “any officer, employee or agent of a postal licensee to destroy or throw away any postal article or anything contained herein”.

Should the postman be convicted, he could face up to 3 years in jail and a ten thousand dollar fine.

SingPost has been required under IMDA’s Postal Quality of Service standards to deliver 99 percent of basic letters within one working day, and 100 percent by two working days. Should SingPost not meet this and other standards, they could be fined as much as S$50,000 a month for each transgression of standards.

Earlier this month SingPost publicly apologized via its Facebook page for its recent lapses, blaming the recent holiday rush, which the public was none too ready to accept, saying that this is not a new problem for the national postal delivery system.

Read related: Another SingPost blunder: Unopened letters dumped in trash at Ang Mo Kio

https://theindependent.sg.sg/another-singpost-blunder-unopened-letters-dumped-in-trash-at-ang-mo-kio/