BERLIN (dpa-AFX) - Sending letters could take a little longer in the future. The Federal Ministry of Economics published a key points paper on Thursday, in which a currently valid rule for the fastest possible letter delivery is presented as no longer up to date. At issue is the requirement that 80 percent of letters be delivered on the next business day - such a rule is to be "adjusted" in the upcoming reform of the outdated Postal Act. That would be a relief for the Post, because it would then have less time pressure. Elsewhere in the paper, however, the Bonn-based company is being held more accountable.

If the 80 percent target were either lowered or abolished, many letters would not land in the mailbox on the next working day, but on the day after next. The paper is a basis for discussion to kick-start the legislative process. A first draft bill could be presented in the summer. What the legal rules will look like in the end is still open.

The paper indicates that a requirement for longer transit times will be tightened. Currently, 95 percent of letters must reach the addressee on the next but one working day. Such a requirement could be raised - either in relation to the day after next after the letter is posted or in relation to the third day after posting.

With these considerations, the ministry is reacting to the fact that the time factor in letter receipt often no longer plays a role, as people resolve urgent written matters with mails or chat messages. "Users' expectations of the various postal services have changed over time," the paper says. "With letters, the focus today is on reliability and commitment; with parcels, the focus is on speed and predictability."

The Postal Act was last fundamentally revised in 1999 - at a time when letters were much more important than today and parcels played only a secondary role.

The tightening of the requirement for longer transit times is intended to ensure that miseries like last year's do not occur again: Due to staffing problems, the postal service delivered letters and parcels much later than usual in some places. This led to a wave of complaints to the Federal Network Agency.

In response to these problems, the regulatory authority called for a sanction option. In the future, it wants to increase the pressure on Deutsche Post to get a better grip on its business by imposing fines or periodic penalty payments. The key issues paper now talks about "effective ordering and sanctioning powers" for the network agency. In response to the key points, Federal Network Agency head Klaus Müller wrote on Twitter that his agency welcomed "the proposals for clearer enforcement rules."

The document also contains other considerations for the upcoming law reform. For example, vending machines could play a role in fulfilling branch network obligations in the future. So far, they don't. The Post maintains so-called postal stations where people can pick up and drop off packages and buy stamps. Such vending machines are likely to be meant.

The Post reacted cautiously to the key points. "The postal sector is faced with continuously declining letter volumes as well as significantly rising costs, which increasingly jeopardize the economic provision of postal services at affordable prices," a company spokesman said. He added that the company wants to "continue to offer good working conditions and invest in the transformation to a climate-neutral mail and parcel service." The key points would "not do justice to the structural challenges in many points". In view of the focus on greater social and ecological sustainability agreed in the coalition agreement, the paper falls short of the mark.

The Bundesverband Briefdienste (Federal Association of Mail Services), in which rather small competitors of Deutsche Post have joined forces, however, assessed the paper positively. "The instruments of the Federal Network Agency will be significantly sharpened, putting the competition for the best services and the lowest prices on a fair footing," said association chairman Walther Otremba./wdw/DP/jha