LPOG Queensland Committee  contact details for Qld members 

An interesting article about why it is cheaper to get goods from China than from anywhere else in Australia! And Trump is also not too happy!

https://www.vox.com/2018/10/19/17996378/trump-china-universal-postal-union-treaty?fbclid=IwAR0-RXywEgtsFLOaz6_rB6upWOuH5sGl69ffaVLtcKZGYEzhuZTi49RBD48

Sadly, no joy for those LPOs that provide a primary sort on behalf of the delivery arm of Australia Post, under the reformed payment scheme.

Since the inception of LPOG in 2013 we have endeavoured to bring the LPO Agreement to the point where Licensees are paid fairly for what they actually do. A bug-bear for many years past has been by reference to the costs and efforts in dealing with parcels, exacerbated by the advent of on-line shopping. 

On this theme our involvement with Post and payment reform (especially since Nicole Sheffield took on the project circa Sept 2018) was premised by an acceptance that a reduced rate letter handling fee (MMF payment) made better sense and could be agreed upon, as the flip-side presented by Post was for a lodgement or delivery scan payment to be paid for all work, on a per item basis, for parcel handling by Licensees. We agreed to work with AP to that intent and LPOG has been so engaged for many months on this project. 
 
As with any issue across the whole network anomalies are thrown up. As most of you would be aware, over the years Licensees who conduct Primary Sorts have had ever increasing workloads due to the ever-increasing numbers of parcels coming through the system.   

We should all know by now that our payment arrangements with Australia Post are under reformation. Stage 1 was focused on mail related payments, and introduced the new, and increased banking payments.

2,860+ LPOs have now received their 9 month YTD dashboards. These dashboards show pretty much the payment reform as it would have impacted the LPO payments, had the payments been paid under the new scheme from 1 July 2018.

LPOG would like to invite interested members to join up in Perth for the weekend of the 26 and 27 of October for a weekend of workshopping, networking and governance!

The 2019 LPOG Annual General Meeting will be held at the Esplanade Hotel in Fremantle.

And the results are visible in our bank accounts once again. The underwhelming payment that has gone into our bank accounts for our April YTD is missing a substantial number of our renewed POBs. The renewals paid in April were not included in our POMs payments, so our payment is underpaid, yet again, by however many POBs you renewed in April via a counter transaction.  

After a resounding amount of very concerned Licensees discussing the changes to payments at the LEEP meetings, and contacting Australia Post to express the alarm over the proposed change to monthly POB payments in arears, Nicole Sheffield has put the plan on hold for this year. It is very clear to the executive of Australia Post that the network is not ready for this change to happen as yet. 

UPDATE: The proposed changes have been put on the back burner for this year, and discussion will take place at a later date to determine the best way forward with this process, including a survivable transition period. Well done Australia Post for listening to Licensees feedback. 

A fair bit of consternation building about the news to the proposed changes to the POB Payments from Licensees who have attended their local LEEP meeting so far.

Licensees will have been very pleased to hear the news from Christine Holgate, on February 15th, to announce that agreement has been reached to finally start introducing stage 1 of the long-awaited payment reform.

Christine Holgate-LPO Payments- Announcement.pdf

As a licensee network, we make a vital contribution both to Australia Post as a business, and to the communities we serve. The new LPO Payments Scheme is an important milestone in this ongoing work that we provide to sustain our communities, and our LPO network all around Australia.

LPOG has worked extensively with Australia Post, and PIP (Partners in Performance as an outside party) to make the changes necessary to help protect the long-term sustainability of our licensee network. LPOG has been lobbying since our inception in 2013, to overhaul the payment scheme, so to reach that milestone is immensely rewarding for our foundation members, and growing Licensee members now onboard, after understanding over the last 5 years that if we don’t help ourselves, no one else is likely too.

Terry Ashcroft has been helping Licensees buy and sell LPOs in NSW for longer than most of us can remember.