Samuel Sedirwa indicated that he travels from Kanye to seek services in Gaborone due to the poor services at the main Kanye post office and the Mmasekou post office.
“I want to renew my book, which they cannot do at Kanye. The queues there are even longer than here at Gaborone Central Post Office,” he said.
Sedirwa told Mmegi that postal services have changed for the worst over the years. He wished there were other options to the post office.
Itumeleng Rabantheng, who stood in the queue for over one hour to send money via the post office said the long queues and poor services are some of government’s ailments. “Everywhere you go in government offices, you will find the same attitude and environment of service delivery,” she said.
She wondered why there were seven counters at the Gaborone Main Mall post office and yet only three of them are manned at any one time. “The counters indicate that each officer has a set of services to provide, but we follow the same line and there is no such speciality,” she said.
At the BBS mall post office, Enametse Sebusang indicated that he had been trying to get service for over three days but to no avail. “Every time I come here and find a long queue, I go back hoping that the following day it will be better. Today I’ve decided to join the queue, otherwise I may never manage to get my money,” he said.
Gail Buchana, told Mmegi that “post offices are always full and slow, no matter what day or what time of the day it is.” He wondered why there were many counters, while only two are ‘operational’ most of the time at certain post offices.
An elderly woman who declined to reveal her identity, shared the other customers’ sentiments about the deteriorating postal services.
“I came here on the 15th of last month and left without getting any help because there was a long queue. I came back towards the end of the month, but the situation was no better. In fact after standing in the queue for four hours, they locked us out to go for lunch. I could not wait any longer. Now today, it is even worse,” she said, pointing at the long queue, at the BBS post office.
Marketing Manager of the Botswana Postal Services, Onalenna Sechele admitted the complaints by customers but gave an explanation for the state of affairs. She indicated that post office tariffs have recently been increased by 40 percent. However, she said that the increment was necessary because tariffs have been low for too long. “Before 2001 the charges were weight based. In 2001 we did not really increase the tariffs. Rather, we restructured them and during the restructuring exercise, the tariffs for some services went down. I do not think that we are asking too much,” she said.
“Restructuring of the tariffs was ideal as it would improve the postal infrastructure and the entire services,” she added. “Before then, our infrastructure was terrible and it was upon us to raise money to make the necessary improvements which include the computer system that we have just introduced,” she said.
She explained that some of the long queues at post offices are caused by remittance of the monthly old age pension cash.
While the elderly are at liberty to collect their pensions any time of the month, Sechele lamented that most of them tend to do so at the end of the month. “That is something that we are still discussing with the department of social services. We are sorting out how best we can serve the elders,” she said.
She explained that some counters remain unmanned in post offices because of staff problems like sickness. “People are sick. And this scenario is not confined to the post office. Everywhere you go these days, people are not working because they are sick. To balance the situation, usually where there are many officers, we move one to relieve at the other side, thereby creating a vacuum where the officer has left,” she said.
