CEN/TR 16915:2015

SLOVENSKI STANDARD
01-januar-2016
Poštne storitve - Kakovost storitev - Poškodbe poštnih pošiljk
Postal services - Quality of service - Damage to postal items
Postalische Dienstleistungen - Dienstqualität - Beschädigung von Postsendungen
Services postaux - Qualité de service - Dommages aux envois postaux
Ta slovenski standard je istoveten z: CEN/TR 16915:2015
ICS:
03.120.99 Drugi standardi v zvezi s Other standards related to
kakovostjo quality
03.240 Poštne storitve Postal services
2003-01.Slovenski inštitut za standardizacijo. Razmnoževanje celote ali delov tega standarda ni dovoljeno.

CEN/TR 16915
TECHNICAL REPORT
RAPPORT TECHNIQUE
November 2015
TECHNISCHER BERICHT
ICS 03.240
English Version
Postal Services - Quality of service - Damage to postal
items
Services postaux - Qualité de service - Dommages aux Postalische Dienstleistungen - Dienstqualität -
envois postaux Beschädigung von Postsendungen

This Technical Report was approved by CEN on 17 November 2015. It has been drawn up by the Technical Committee CEN/TC
331.
CEN members are the national standards bodies of Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia,
Finland, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania,
Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and
United Kingdom.
EUROPEAN COMMITTEE FOR STANDARDIZATION
COMITÉ EUROPÉEN DE NORMALISATION

EUROPÄISCHES KOMITEE FÜR NORMUNG

CEN-CENELEC Management Centre: Avenue Marnix 17, B-1000 Brussels
© 2015 CEN All rights of exploitation in any form and by any means reserved Ref. No. CEN/TR 16915:2015 E
worldwide for CEN national Members.

Contents Page
European foreword . 3
Introduction . 4
1 Scope . 5
2 Terms and definitions . 5
3 Main issues concerning the damages of postal items . 6
3.1 General . 6
3.2 Solutions applied by operators . 6
4 Prevention actions . 16
5 Measurements . 16
5.1 General . 16
5.2 Analysis of the database of complaints . 17
5.3 Reference to EN 14012 . 18
6 Activities to mitigate impact of damages . 19
7 Parameters of postal items affecting the number of damages . 19
Bibliography . 20
European foreword
This document (CEN/TR 16915:2015) has been prepared by Technical Committee CEN/TC 331 “Postal
services”, the secretariat of which is held by NEN.
Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of
patent rights. CEN [and/or CENELEC] shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent
rights.
This document has been prepared under a mandate given to CEN by the European Commission and the
European Free Trade Association.
Introduction
The postal services sector offers an essential communication infrastructure of major economic and
social importance for commercial users and consumers. Postal services have a substantial effect on the
competitiveness of other sectors and European cohesion in general. In particular, the effectiveness of
postal services is crucial for the development of business to business and home delivery in Europe and
therefore is considered as a service of general economic interest (SGEI).
Directive 97/67, in particular its Article 20, recognizes the importance of the role of standardization
and also takes into account the wellness of users in particular. The European Commission has further
supported the process of technical standardization in the postal sector through mandates to the
European Committee for Standardization (CEN). A first standardization mandate (M/240) was issued in
March 1996. Based on the progress achieved within this mandate, a second CEN mandate (M/312) was
issued by the Commission in 2001.
The European Commission has recently issued another mandate to CEN (M/428) requesting CEN to
perform standardization activities in order to adjust the existing European Standards for postal services
in a multi-players environment, to develop new technical standards to improve the interoperability in
the postal sector and to study the feasibility of new standards in the area of quality of service (QoS).
This document was developed based on experiences of project team PT-I, in working group
CEN/TC 331/WG 1. A final result of PTI project was Feasibility study when the PT-I came to the
conclusion, that:
— the project as a European Standard (EN) is not feasible,
— it is feasible to develop a guide with the best practice/benchmark list,
— the guide can be published either as TR or attached as an informative annex to the EN 14012.
Finally, the TR as guide to EN 14012 related to best practice related to minimizing number of damages
and actions to mitigation effects of damages of postal items was chosen.
1 Scope
This Technical Report is an extension as a guide to the European Standard EN 14012 with regard to
damage of postal items. EN 14012 recommends:
The continual improvement of the overall quality of service is an objective of the complaint handling
system, and using the information from the complaint handling process to improve the overall quality of
service should be a permanent objective of any postal organization.
Complaint handling processes should allow analysis of complaint causes.
However, it does not contain detailed guidelines to possible solutions. Damages are a rare event and a
standard for measurement proved not to be feasible. This document contains a set of best practices
dedicated to use by postal operators regardless of their size and users of postal services.
2 Terms and definitions
For the purposes of this document, the following terms and definitions apply.
2.1
CN43/BDV
verification note, i.e. a form to report an anomaly or a set of anomalies with a letter mail dispatch or a
consignment to a partner postal operator
Note 1 to entry: BDV - bulletin de vérification, the form in French.
2.2
CP78/BDV
verification note, i.e. a form to report an anomaly or a set of anomalies with a parcel dispatch or a
consignment to a partner postal operator
Note 1 to entry: BDV - bulletin de vérification, the form in French.
2.3
damaged postal item
postal item which is not in the same condition as the provider accepted it from the sender
Note 1 to entry: The term “damage to postal items” usually implies that the contents of postal items are partially
or completely damaged so that they became partly or whole unusable for their intended purposes, especially, for
the purpose which that content had for the sender when he sent it to the recipient.
2.4
postal item
item addressed in the final form in which it is to be carried by a postal service provider
Note 1 to entry: In addition to items of correspondence, such items also include for instance books, catalogues,
newspapers, periodicals or containing merchandise with or without commercial value.
2.5
postal services
services involving the clearance, sorting, transport and delivery of postal items
3 Main issues concerning the damages of postal items
3.1 General
Figure 1 — Damage of postal item
The definition from EN 14012:2008, 3.16 item damage complaint also includes damage to the wrapping
/ envelope. From the technical point of view, the wrapping protects the contents from the damage
during the whole technological process and, if the wrapping had been damaged before the delivery to
the addressee, that event would likely lead to the damage of the content. Therefore, analysis of causes of
damage to the wrapping may also be relevant.
It should be taken under consideration that only damages covering loss or damages of contents will be
complained about. What's more, the client cannot raise the complaint if item was damaged and repaired
without damage or loss content. Therefore complaint database can be source of information only for
postal items damaged in big degree.
3.2 Solutions applied by operators
All participated parties that are the sender, the addressee and the operator are interested in delivery of
letter / parcel in good condition. There are two cases that should be considered:
a) E-commerce. The sender sells things generally in factory made, good quality packaging, which is
resistant to typical events related to transportation. Usually the shop adds corporate packaging,
which is a next layer of wrapping and make packaging more safe.
b) Private sender, who hasn't experienced in packaging and in this case support of operator is
expected.
Tables 1 to 11 contain information collected from 11 European operators in PT-I project related to
number of damages in postal services, activities to decrease number of damages and to mitigate their
effects. Responses to the questionnaire were sent by:
1) HR - Croatia - Hrvatska Pošta d.d.;
2) CZ - Czech Republic – UNMZ;
3) DK - Denmark - Post Danmark Logistik A/S;
4) IE - Ireland - An Post;
5) DE - Germany - Deustche Post AG;
6) HU - Hungary - Magyar Posta Zrt;
7) MT - MALTA - MaltaPost p.l.c.;
8) PL - Poland - Poczta Polska S.A.;
9) PT - Portugal - CTT - Correios de Portugal, S.A.;
10) SK - Slovak Republic - Slovenská Pošta, a. s.;
11) CH - Switzerland - Swiss Post.
Volume of damaged items (1 and 3)
After we had analysed the results from the second questionnaire, we were faced with some facts. The
volume of damaged items is very small. The typical number of damaged items largely depends on the
type of postal service. Only one operator led separate statistics for small packets.
Table 1 — Percent of damaged items
Maximu
Service Average Deviation Minimum Replies from
m
Ordinary HR, DK, DE, HU, MT, PT,
0,005 62 0,012 0 0,000 031 0 0,03
letters/postcards CH
HR, CZ, DK, HU, MT, PL,
Registered letters 0,005 71 0,010 3 0,000 071 9 0,03
PT, SK, CH
HR, CZ, DK, HU, PT, SK,
Ensured letters 0,007 74 0,010 3 0,000 646 0,03
CH
Small packets (up to 2kg) 0,020 1 0,014 6 0,0034 0,03 DK, MT, PT, CH
HR, CZ, DK, DE, HU, PL,
Parcels 0,015 8 0,023 5 0,000 1 0,075 6
PT, SK, CH
HR, CZ, DK, HU, PL, PT,
Herein ensured parcels 0,038 6 0,077 6 0,000 45 0,196 7
SK, CH
NOTE 1 Part of operators sent collective data for a few services.
NOTE 2 Only Denmark provides separately statistics to small packets. Other operators include this service in the
ordinary letters.
NOTE 3 Germany provides statistic for 4 degrees of damages. Spread is huge, from level of small damage (e.g.
dirty wrapping) 0,2 % to the highest level of damage - complaints because of the damage 0,001 %.
Table 2 — Keeping statistical data about the cause of damage
Number of YES are Percent of
Service Countries which collect the statistics
answers collected YES
Ordinary
11 4 36,36 HR, IE, DE, PT
letters/postcards
Registered letters 11 4 36,36 HR, CZ, IE, PL
Ensured letters 10 4 40,00 HR, CZ, IE, PL
Small packets (up to 2kg) 9 2 22,22 HR, IR
Parcels 11 6 54,55 HR, CZ, IE, DE, PL, CH
Herein ensured parcels 10 5 50,00 HR, CZ, IE, PL, CH
NOTE The following sources of information are given:
— complaint database - 5 countries (1 country - only for complaint with compensation),
— complaint database + other sources - 1 country,
— collected daily in the sorting centres in every processing line - 1 country,
— only for the samples of the external measurement system - 1 country,
— no statistic, each “case” is assessed individually – 1 country,
— 2 counties do not provide the statistic.
Table 3 — Volume of the damaged items with partly or fully missing content
Service Average Deviation Minimum Maximum Replies from
Ordinary letters/postcards 0,000 076 5 0,000 107 0,000 0124 0,000 2 HR, DK, HU
Registered letters 0,000 362 0,000 357 0,000 085 2 0,001 06 HR, CZ, DK, HU, PL, SK
Ensured letters 0,003 57 0,004 20 0,000 64 0,010 8 HR, CZ, HU, PL, SK
Small packets (up to 2kg) 0,009 7  0,009 7 0,009 7 DK
HR, CZ, DK, HU, PL, SK,
Parcels 0,005 27 0,005 50 0,000 01 0,015 8
CH
Herein ensured parcels 0,030 2 0,058 6 0,000 337 0,118 CZ, HU, PL, SK
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