Posta looks to digital boxes to overturn bad fortunes; hopes to increase revenue by Sh1.5bn

NAIROBI, Kenya, Nov 29- The Postal Corporation of Kenya is now targeting to increase its revenues by Sh1.5 billion through digital boxes after it witnessed a fall in letters during the last financial year.

According to data released by the Communication Authority, Posta had a decline in the number of letters posted locally in a year to 47.1 million compared to 115.58 million it posted 10 years go.

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The hope to recover from the losses has been brought about by adopting digitization after it partnered with Safaricom to create digital boxes, under the name M-Post.

Speaking during the launch of the product, Postmaster General and Marketing Chief Executive Officer Dan Kagwe say it is a postal service and one that will smoothen delivery of goods for East Africa’s largest telco firm.

“We do not have any revenue share with Safaricom so its supporting us because they want to open up on logistics since every customer has been stuck when it comes to the delivery point,” said Kagwe.

Under the new service, across all the telco firms’ customers looking to sign up can visit Postal Corporation’s website or dial *234# and register for a Post Office Box linked to their mobile number at a cost of Sh300.

Other telco providers as Airtel and Telkom can use *890*90# to receive their Mpost code.

The Mpost box numbers will be in the format “P. O. Box 254XXXXXXXXX” where XXXXXXXXX denotes the customer’s mobile phone number, for example, “P. O. Box 254722000000”.

Customers will then have the option of selecting their drop off point to pick their deliveries in which one can also change their parcel disposal through additional cost by dialing *234#.

The new services is also expected to increase e-commerce penetration which Postmaster General and Marketing Chief Executive Officer Dan Kagwe describe as being less than one percent.

“Right now, the e-commerce penetration is hardly, and we can increase our e-commerce penetration to 50 percent as this is a youthful product and we are sure they will engage,” Kagwe added.

ICT Cabinet Secretary Joe Mucheru said the innovation is in line with the country’s digitization plan as it has also opened doors for more jobs.

“The service fits squarely we have for the digitization of Kenya and the continent and we are going to use some of our interns who are more than 300 who will go spread the message in the local areas,” the ICT boss said.