India Post seeks services of students, unemployed for delivering goods

India Post seeks services of students, unemployed for delivering goods

New Delhi: With online orders piling up, India Post is hiring students and the jobless to deliver goods, S.K. Sinha, secretary at the department of post, said on Thursday.

The department recently issued orders under which it can hire third-party persons, such as unemployed people and students, to pick up and deliver articles from post offices, with a 12% commission for every delivery.

“If you pick up about 10 orders of about 1 kg, you can earn Rs.100-250 per day,” said Sinha, adding that the programme will also help generate employment. There’s an upper limit for how much commission you can earn.

The outsourcing will augment its parcel service and bring it at par with other private parcel services that offer to pick up orders from the customer’s location.

The postal department’s revenue from COD (cash on delivery) consignments from e-commerce majors surged to Rs.1,300 crore in the year ending March 2016, up from Rs.500 crore in 2014-15, and just Rs.100 crore in 2013-14.

E-commerce firms availing India Post’s services include all the major online portals such as Amazon India, Flipkart as well as Snapdeal.

The requirements to register for the program is an identification proof and reference from two prominent person known to the post office, after which the third party will be given a licence to deliver and pick up articles.

With e-commerce and financial services expected to take off, the department is expecting earnings from these services to help break even in the next 6-7 years.

India Post recorded a deficit of about Rs.6,000 crore for fiscal year 2015, a 14.4% increase from a year earlier.

The department is also looking at revenue from its online service, e-post office, which sells philately products as well as the newly launched bottled Gangajal, water from the river Ganga.

There is strong demand for Gangajal with almost all the stock sold out, added Sinha.

India Post has sold at least 4,000 bottles of Gangajal, considered holy by Hindus, from its post offices and online and has witnessed strong demand from southern states such as Tamil Nadu.

“While India Post doesn’t generate any profit from the Gangajal program, it does create a lot of goodwill for the department, which in turn can help attract users for its speed post and banking services,” Sinha said.