User:JMZ Postal Industry Advisor

"Postal Service" aka "National Postal Operator" -- The government agency that operates the national postal service or post office, i.e., a.) Transportation and universal delivery of “mail”, including: letters (correspondence, documents and transactions), magazines and newspapers (information, entertainment and advertising), packages (merchandise), and catalogs, flyers and direct mail letters (advertising and marketing), b.) The retail network that provides access to these services, and c.) Ancillary financial transactions such as money orders and postal savings accounts (a banking function).

Additionally, many foreign postal services were also charged with regulating telegraph and telephone services, hence the acronym PTT, for post, telegraph and telephone, most commonly seen in Europe.

Postal services generally are among the oldest of government agencies, often spanning centuries in a country’s history. In a sense, they are a premier example of a legacy communications system.

Mail is defined or characterized by the “class” of service for each of the physical types described above. These classes are generally defined (named or ‘branded’) and priced, based on a.) Contents and delivery standards or timeframes or b.) Size, weight, shape and speed of delivery, or a hybrid of these characteristics. Method A has been the traditional postal ‘product’ (service) model, but is now giving way to the more commercially oriented method B.

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