The village of Anttila in Porvoo becomes a development environment for the mail delivery of the future

Itella will launch a voluntary-based delivery trial in the village of Anttila in Porvoo. Over 140 households and companies based in Anttila have joined in. In cooperation with customers, the trial launched in April will develop and test alternatives for mail delivery in future decades. The trial is a combination of traditional mail delivery and new electronic means of receiving daily mail. The Technical Research Centre of Finland (VTT) is involved in the co-operation.

- The development work will be carried out using the Living Lab operating model. It means that mail delivery services will be developed in cooperation with customers in the actual operating environment of the services. We want to ask the customers what kind of delivery services they would like to use in decades to come, says Tommi Tikka, Development Director at Itella.

-Itella is actively involved in developing electronic communication services. Participating in a trial dealing with totally new kinds of mail delivery services will also give our customers the opportunity to learn how to use electronic services. In sparsely populated areas, there is a need for innovative basic services, says Tommi Tikka, Development Director at Itella.

The trial concerns Itella's daily mail and parcel deliveries, but not separate newspaper delivery. Itella will provide the trial participants with computers and data connections for using the digital services.

More information for the media:
Tommi Tikka, Development Director, tel. +358 50 462 7645, firstname.lastname@itella.com

This is how the trial will be carried out:

• Mail will be delivered twice a week to the mailbox as usual. Moreover, all mail recipient households and companies have a P.O. box at their local postal outlet, where mail is delivered on other days, and from where the customer may pick up the mail whenever at any time. New mail in the box will be notified by a text message.
• Besides physical mail delivery, the customer's first-class and second-class letters will be scanned as electronic letters which the customer may view on NetPosti using his or her personal codes. After scanning, the letters will be enveloped and delivered to the customer's P.O. box or mailbox. The scanning is carried out separately from other mail handling, which means that the confidentiality of letters is not compromised. Customers involved in the cooperation have been requested for permission with regard to scanning.
• A new pick-up method will also be tested for parcel deliveries. At the local postal outlet, there will be a parcel machine from where the customer may him/herself pick up parcels. The customer will receive a text message when there is a shipment to pick up. However, large shipments and shipments requiring signature will be picked up from the local postal outlet as usual.