Australia Post has announced group revenue for the first half hitting $3.8bn, up by 4% Y-o-Y and group profit before tax only reaching $83m, reporting a 46% decrease down to $71m.
Australia Post’s parcel and services revenue increased 13% Y-o-Y reaching $2.7bn, up almost $300m, underpinned by strong growth in parcels, financial and international services, supporting both business and consumer customers. Profits from these businesses saw an increase of 12% to $193m. Community Post Office revenue grew 4% reflecting stronger performances in both corporate and licensed stores.
This is the highest revenue growth in over a decade for these services without a major acquisition. All these business lines operate in highly competitive markets and they account for over 70% of group revenue.
Letter revenue was down 9% to $1.1.bn and letter losses rose a further $46m or 112% to a total loss of $87m for this half. Although Australia Post secured $129m in efficiencies in the period and has benefited from strong growth in other areas, this still has not fully compensated for the increasing costs supporting this important community service.
Group Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director Christine Holgate said, “The costs to operate the letter business continue to rise, as our people are still required to deliver to every home or business every day, process and collect the mail, whilst letter volumes and revenues fall. The $0.10 letter increase in January will support our letters business going forward, but after four years of no increases, it alone will not fully compensate for the losses. This Christmas was our busiest ever and we delivered over 50m parcels in December, with over 3.1m on our biggest day. Over 190m letters were delivered, 4600 staff hired across the national network and pleasingly during this time complaints to our customer service teams decreased by 14%”.
Consistent with previous years, Australia Post expects the second half to again be quieter. At this stage the business remains on track to deliver a marginal profit at the full year and is cognisant of the market pressures facing core customers.
Source: Australia Post
*$ = AUD1.49 / € = AUD0.91
