Indian Postal Department: the new face
Indian Postal Department has been operating and expanding its services in India very efficiently since last many years. It is having one of the biggest financial networks in India, having its existence right from prime location in metro cities to most interior part of rural india. Now, Indian Postal Department is taking up new look and new name of ‘India Post’.
To have a look on the prosperity of the department, postman of department is now driving a bike instead cycle to dispatch post, money order services are taking up global shape and postal department owns their aircrafts to deliver their postal services on time. Postal department is not only dealing with mutual funds but also providing cash card services, going to step into core banking along with providing ATM services and so on. Let take a look into the new shape of postal department in terms of new services going to be launched in near future:
Biggest Saving Bank
The idea of providing saving bank services came into existence in 1865 which was initially governed and operated by government treasury. In 1883, after so many changes in the operational part, it was opened to general public which resulted into 39121 saving accounts holding Rs. 2.79 crore. In 1954 saving account was increased 5.1 crore holding Rs. 2232 crore and currently number of saving account has reached 20 crore holding more than Rs. 5 lacs crore. Post office saving accounts are operated from 1,38,622 rural and 16,537 urban saving banks.
Core Banking and ATM Services
Postal department saving bank is working as nationalized banks. Postal department is waiting for the approval from Finance Ministry to launch core banking services. Initially these services will be started in 4000 post office in India. You can operate your saving account from anywhere in the country. Postal department will also provide ATM facilities.
International Money Order Services
Postal department is offering Money Order services and Instant Money Order Service (IMO) with association with the Western Union Financial Services, USA. Western Union Financial Services provides the worldwide network including banks and financial institution to transfer money worldwide.
Prepaid Card facilities
Postal department is launching its prepaid card services which can be used as cash card having the maximum value of Rs. 20,000. Hence now you don’t have to travel or go for shopping along with your cash, you can get your prepaid card from any post office.
Dealing with Mutual fund
Post department is also active in selling mutual funds units, although this service is active at only few post offices. These services are on hold as there are few disputes on commission part while dealing with mutual funds units. These disputes came into existence after the entry load is made inapplicable in mutual funds. As soon as these disputes are solved, postal department will start transacting in mutual funds again.
Exclusive pin code services
Looking at the competition with courier services, postal department have allocated exclusive postal pin code services to many corporate. Corporate companies who are availing this service receive their postal mails directly from the main business center of postal department instead of the local post offices. By this they receives their mails faster than before. Hence this service has redesigned the pin code with an intention to launch it as a marketing tool of postal department.
Account information from E-center
Postal department is going to launch E-Center to track your posts and letters. Postal department will open Letter Tracking Centers having latest technology wherein you will be able to know the exact location of your posts or letters by just feeding in the addressees’ name or senders’ name. Postal department have bought two machines to extract the posts and letters which cost almost Rs. 60 crore. It is planning to buy few more machines to save time of their employees. Postal department already owned three aircrafts and going to buy in near future to dispatch the letters as soon as possible.
Rural Price Index Analysis
In India, post offices exists 15 states and about 1200 villages. Postal department is going to start working on rural price index analysis for commodity market by which it can keep track of cost of living in rural areas. By this postal department will work as the medium to measure the Inflation in rural areas of the country.
Hence we can say that postal department is taking up new shape in the form Financial Super Store to take up the monopoly in the earning maximum revenue.