The Monopolies Commission advocates a reform of the Postal Services Act that would enable competitive opportunities to be exploited through competition-oriented regulation. The existing, unpublished draft bill from the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy provides a sound basis for this.
At a glance
The Postal Services Act of 1997 is in need of fundamental reform. The current regulatory framework, which favours Deutsche Post AG at the expense of consumers and competitors, should not be continued. The aim of any reform should be to support the development opportunities currently available in the letter market through competition-oriented regulation.
- Access to partial services should be extended to parcel post, newspapers and magazines in order to make the letter market more attractive to competitors.
- The profit margin, as part of the costs of efficient service provision, should once again be calculated on the basis of a return on capital, as is customary in other network industries. The current procedure generated an additional profit of at least EUR 150 million for Deutsche Post AG in 2019 alone, at the expense of customers and competitors.
