Card payments are finally being accepted for certain services in MaltaPost branches, the country’s national postal service has confirmed.
Customers can now pay for stamps, stationery and postal fees by credit or debit card in branches across the country.
The change will be welcomed by customers who have long complained about being forced to pay with cash.
However, while certain services can now be paid for by card, bill payments, Western Union transfers, mobile phone top-ups and ‘One-4-All’ gift vouchers will remain cash-only.
When Times of Malta visited MaltaPost branches in St Julian’s and Birżebbuġa on Saturday, both confirmed they had started offering card payments recently.
When contacted, a spokesperson for the company said the roll-out of card payments had started late last year and had been completed in the last week.
Asked why card payments had not been introduced sooner, the spokesperson said there had been “valid commercial reasons” for the delay, stressing it did not make business sense to do so earlier.
Describing criticism of the company for not offering card payments sooner as “unfair”, the spokesperson said the company had eventually decided to “take the plunge”, however.
He added that unlike other organisations such as banks, MaltaPost had retained all of its branches after the COVID-19 pandemic and was committed to “retaining a presence in the heart of the community.”
He said the company operated around 40 post offices and an additional 20 sub-post offices across Malta and employed around 300 postal delivery workers nationwide.
A report published last month found most MaltaPost users are satisfied with the services provided by the postal company and would even be willing to pay extra for stamps if the company used that money for green initiatives.
A survey carried out by the communications regulator late last year showed that 72% of respondents said they were satisfied or very satisfied with the country’s postal service.
Meanwhile, just 15% of respondents said they had lodged complaints with MaltaPost, compared to the high 34% complaint rate registered in a similar survey in 2021.