Polish Post

Poczta Polska

Type	State-owned public company
Industry	Postal services, courier
Founded	1558
Headquarters	Warsaw
Services	Letter post, parcel service, EMS, delivery, freight forwarding, third-party logistics, deposit accounts
Number of employees	c. 86,000
Website	www.poczta-polska.pl

Poczta Polska (Polish Post) is the state postal administration of Poland. It provides postal services (letters and parcels), banking and insurance services as well as logistics services. The company also provides digital services such as neo-stamp, neo-letter, neo-postcard, made available through the Internet platform Envelo.

Formally known as Poczta Polska Spółka Akcyjna (Polish Postal Service Joint Stock Company), it has two large subsidiary companies: Capital Group Poczta Polska (Post Bank) and Pocztowe Towarzystwo Ubezpieczeń Wzajemnych (Postal Mutual Insurance Association). The State Treasury of Poland is the founder and sole shareholder of Polish Post, which is the responsibility of the Minister of Administration and Digitization.

Poczta Polska acts as a designated operator. i.e. operator who is responsible for providing public postal services, which for common good are provided in a uniform manner at affordable prices. The Post has the responsibility to provide, five days a week within the area of the entire country, services including clearance, sorting, transport and delivery of letters, including registered letters and declared-value letters, up to 2 kg; postal parcels, including the declared-value parcels, up to 10 kg (parcels sent from abroad may weigh up to 20 kg); and postal items for the visually impaired persons up to 7 kg. In addition, it must enable the sender, at his request, to receive the document confirming the receipt of the registered parcels.

The basis for the postal organization was the trading postal service, which derived from the merchants' need to communicate on commercial matters. These merchants were from Germany, and later on also from Italy, therefore most active relationships were maintained with them. In the 14th and 15th centuries Cracow was communicating with German towns through messengers, who were remunerated by commercial confraternities. The best designed trading post of this type was owned by the Fugger family who at the end of the 15th century established their factories in Cracow. Initially they were used for the trade of copper. With time, though, they started to also deal with financing operations. The Fugger Post was primary used only for the maintenance of communications between these factories and the central office in Augsburg. In later years, its services were used by the king Sigismund I of Poland, the queen Bona Sforza and the vice-chancellor Piotr Tomicki.