Post office puts together new price package

Post office charges for letters and parcels look set to rise Keystone

The cost of sending a letter or a parcel in Switzerland is set to go up by as much as 20 per cent if the government accepts the post office's new price proposals.

The post office wants to put up the price of a first class letter by 80 centimes to one SFr1. Second class letters would increase by the same amount to 80 centimes, and the cost of sending a parcel would go up by 20 per cent from 2001.

The price rises are part of proposals the post office has handed in to the government for an increase in its mail delivery charges.

But the price hike is not as much as the post office would have liked. In April, the government rejected the original price proposals which would have seen first and second class letters rise to SFr1.50 and SFr1.20 respectively, from July 1. It said it wanted to see what the financial consequences would be of introducing value added tax on certain post office services in 2001.

Under the new proposals, the post office has also backed down from its demand to charge for letters based on two weight categories; up to 50 grammes and between 51 and 100 grammes.

The post office has already announced increases in its charges for sending letters and parcels abroad. It is responsible for setting its own rates in the liberalised foreign market.

It is now up to the government to decide later this summer whether the revised price changes can go ahead after they have been passed to the price regulator.

swissinfo with agencies