Universal services

Universal services represent the minimum set of services that have to be continuously provided throughout the Czech Republic under the same conditions to all users at an affordable price and specified quality. The universal services include the most important postal services, including international ones that are essential for the public (ordinary items and parcels, registered items, insured items, postal orders).

At European level, the universal services are described by the Directive on common rules for the development of internal market of Community postal services and the improvement of quality of service. The Directive generally uses the term universal service for universal services.

The scope of universal services is specified in Section 3 of the Postal Services Act:

1. the delivery of postal items up to 2 kg;
2. the delivery of postal parcels up to 10 kg;
3. the delivery of amount of money by postal order;
4. the delivery of registered items;
5. the delivery of insured items;
6. the free delivery of postal items up to 7 kg for the visually impaired;
7. the services that have to be provided on the basis of the obligations arising from the membership of the Czech Republic in the Universal Postal Union.

The following table summarizes universal services:

Universal services have to allow every working day at least one clearance and at least one delivery to the address of every natural or legal person. Detailed technical specification of universal services is stipulated in The Decree No 464/2012 Coll., on the determination of specifications of individual universal services and basic quality requirements for their provision.This Decree describes in detail the technical specification of the individual universal services, the method of securing the services, the minimum requirements for the accessibility of Post Offices and post boxes and the information that should be available to postal service users (on request or by posting it at the Post Offices or at the provider’s web site). The Decree is not intended to put any limits (in addition to the obligations set out in the Decree) on how providers provide their services.

Government order No. 178/2015 Coll., on the determination of the minimum number of workplaces for the provision of universal services became effective on 1 January 2016. This order set that the minimum number of postal licence holders workplaces for ensuring and providing universal services is 3200.

The decision to grant a postal licence

The Council of the CTU issued a decision to grant a postal licence (only Czech version – rozhodnutí čj. ČTÚ-562/2013-610/IV. vyř.), which imposed an obligation to ensure general availability of all universal services under the Section 3 of the Postal Services Act continuously throughout the Czech Republic.

čj. ČTÚ-562/2013-610/IV. vyř.