Czech Post has expanded its parcel delivery options from March but promptly announced a price increase for its ‘Balíkovna’ services. A rise in costs justified this decision. However, the postal company will temporarily offer significantly cheaper home deliveries.
The ‘Balíkovna’ services function at post offices and other locations, such as kiosks or convenience stores. There are over eight thousand of them across the Czech Republic. From April, sending a parcel from one ‘Balíkovna’ to another will cost two additional crowns, making the new price 77 crowns for unregistered users. For registered users, the price will be 69 crowns, an increase of four crowns.
The ‘Balíkovna’ with cash on delivery will also increase by two crowns to 96 crowns for unregistered users and 88 for registered users. Registration can be easily done on the ‘Balíkovna’ website, and a password will be sent to your email.
“For nearly two years, the price remained unchanged, but the costs for this service increased. We adjusted the price increase to make the financial impact on customers as small as possible. During April, there will also be an option to use a special offer, where the delivery of a parcel by ‘Balíkovna’ to an address, not a pick-up point, will cost 30 crowns,” Matyáš Vitík, spokesperson for the post, told the news.
Czech Post offers even more parcel delivery options, but they are more expensive than ‘Balíkovna.’ A parcel to hand costs 129 crowns, and a parcel to the post office costs 109 crowns; these prices will remain the same.
Czech Post is expected to transform into a state operator of branches and a commercial ‘Balíkovna’ with logistics services throughout this and next year. The leadership of the post office and members of the government, Interior Minister Vít Rakušan (STAN) and Finance Minister Zbyněk Stanjura (ODS) admitted that a minority stake in ‘Balíkovna’ could be obtained by a private investor. This investment would help save some of the transformation costs, which politicians estimate at a minimum of four billion crowns.