Managing Change in the Postal and Delivery Industries brings together practitioners, postal administrators, the express industry, regulators, economists and lawyers to examine the important policy and regulatory issues facing the postal and delivery industries. This volume reviews such topics as international postal policy, the universal service obligation, regulation and competition, entry and the role of scale and scope economics, cost analysis in postal services, and service standards. This book provides a unique perspective on the problems facing postal and delivery networks.

Worldwide, there is considerable interest in postal and delivery economics. Governments, particularly in the European Union, are examining closely the roles of the two systems and how best to regulate them. This volume brings together 20 essays originally presented at the 12th Conference on Postal and Delivery Economics held in Cork, Ireland in June 2004. Contributors include researchers, practitioners, and senior managers from throughout the world.

This book addresses major issues facing postal and delivery services throughout the world. Worldwide, there is currently a considerable amount of interest in postal and delivery economics. The industry is in a state of near crisis and drastic change is needed. The European Commission and member States are still wrestling with the problem of how to implement entry liberalization into postal markets, how to address digital competition, and how to maintain the universal service obligation (USO). The Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 in the U.S. has perhaps created and exacerbated the problems faced by USPS. Post Offices (POs) have been slow to address the threat of electronic competition. On the other hand, e-commerce presents opportunities for POs to expand their presence in parcel delivery and perhaps help finance or redefine the USO. A major aim of this book is to address strategies POs can use to reinvent themselves for the digital age.This book compiles original essays by prominent researchers in the field, which will be selected and edited from papers presented at the 25th Conference on Postal and Delivery Economics held in Barcelona, Spain, May 24-27, 2017. That conference, and this volume, commemorates the memory of Michael Crew who organized twenty-four prior conferences and co-edited previous conference volumes. This book is a useful tool not only for graduate students and professors, but also for postal administrations, consulting firms, and Federal Government departments.

The European Commission and its member states, along with many others, are wrestling with the problem of how to implement the scheduled liberalization of the postal sector while maintaining the universal service obligation. This book addresses some of these concerns. It is comprised of original essays chosen from among several dozen presented at the 13th Conference on Postal and Delivery Economics, which was held in Antwerp, Belgium, in June, 2005.

When Postmaster General Creswell penned his concern about the impact 2 of electronic diversion on his postal organization, the year was 1872. General Creswell, it turned out, fretted unnecessarily. Facsimile did not achieve commercial viability until roughly a century after his tenure as Postmaster General and today that technology is fading rapidly from the communication scene. Moreover, it never appears to have significantly affected physical letter volumes. However, if General Creswell were leading a major postal organization today, he likely would feel threatened by the potential of Internet communication to cause electronic diversion of physical mail. Should recent technology developments cause the oft-predicted (but so far incorrect) inflection point that would mark the beginning of declining mail volumes. the implications from a management standpoint will be profound. The relatively fixed nature of postal costs suggest that volume declines must be offset though improved productivity, reduced cost of inputs, revenue from new products that share common costs, or reduced level of universal service.

Emerging Competition in Postal and Delivery Services brings together practitioners, postal administrators, the courier industry, regulators, academic economists and lawyers to examine important policy and regulatory issues facing the postal and delivery industries. This volume reviews such topics as cost and productivity analysis, universal service and entry, demand analysis and the structure of postal payment system, price regulation and competition.