Department of Posts to introduce 24-hour, 48-hour speed post services in Chennai this month

The Department of Posts will soon launch ‘Speed Post 24’ and ‘Speed Post 48’ services in the city to ensure faster and more reliable delivery, among a host of other new services.

Designed to serve the e-commerce and logistics sector while leveraging an extensive post office network, the two services promise guaranteed delivery within 24 hours and 48 hours respectively from the date of booking. The facility of booking and delivery would be available in 97 post offices in various Chennai divisions.

Officials of the Postal Department said the services are being introduced in six metros, including Chennai, Kolkata, and Bengaluru. Both the time-sensitive services are being run on a trial basis in the city, ahead of their formal launch this month. Deliveries would be one time password-based like e-commerce platforms.

Customers choosing between the two services would have end-to-end tracking through portal and text message alerts. They can claim refund if delivery is delayed beyond the promised schedule. Tariffs are being streamlined, officials said.

At Chennai GPO alone, nearly 40,000 speed post articles are booked daily by retail and bulk customers. C. Swathi Madhurima, Chief Postmaster, Chennai GPO, said: “We booked and delivered nearly 1,420 articles for Speed Post 24 and Speed Post 48 services in Chennai GPO alone in January, on a trial basis. We have extended counter working hours from 10 a.m. to 6 a.m. the following day. The volume of daily postal transactions has increased by 400 due to overnight operations.”

While welcoming the move, residents in suburbs said the city pincodes must be extended to developing areas such as Thiruninravur in the Chennai Metropolitan Area. Postal customers like Murugaiyan of Thiruninravur travel to city post offices to book speed post articles for a lower tariff.

T. Sadagopan, a resident of Pattabiram, said such time-bound services must be extended to all branch offices in the neighbouring districts. He demanded that the working hours of post office counters be extended in areas like Pattabiram to compete with private services.