One million parcels a day The suffering of postmen and women during the Christmas season

Christmas time, time for rest and relaxation. But not for postmen and women, who have to contend with many problems. This is impressively demonstrated in a short film.

Christmas time is supposed to be the most wonderful time of the year. But for postmen and women, it's a time of pure stress. Up to one million parcels are delivered every day until Christmas, compared to 600,000 otherwise, according to Blick.

"Christmas is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the workload in the delivery industry," Matthias Loosli from the Syndicom trade union told Blick.

A short film entitled "Roter Sessel - Stimmen von Postbot:innen" (Red armchair - voices of postmen and women) shows how those affected feel. Four people talk openly about their stressful working day.

One of them is 28-year-old Barbara Bettosini. She likes her job, especially the variety and riding her moped. She gets up at 5.40 a.m. and then goes to work, and in summer she is home by 3 p.m. at the latest. "It's difficult in winter. We've had a lot of absences in recent years, which is why I've sometimes worked until 8.30 pm. Then you no longer have a work-life balance."

47-year-old Yvonne Krebs has a normal working day of eight hours and 24 minutes. "My working time is finished when I've delivered everything and done the follow-up work, and maybe done some preparatory work for the next day. Sometimes that's a 10- or 11-hour day." She recognizes the increasing strain on her employees. Health and family problems have increased.

Victor Perez is 50 years old, the proud father of a three-year-old daughter and has been with Swiss Post for 25 years. He sees an even bigger problem with the workload. "It didn't used to be like this. You knew: at Christmas time, I'm not available on the busy days. But now it's like that all year round. And at some point it's too much." His private life also suffers as a result.

Problem since corona

João Moreira, 33 years old, has an 11-month-old child. He particularly likes the freedom he has at work, despite the sometimes bad weather. But of course he also wants to spend time with his child, but family life is becoming increasingly difficult. "The problem has been since Corona. It has exploded. Back then, we delivered 300, 400 parcels. And then at some point the post office thought: yes, great, they can do it! Why not every day?"

For all four interviewees, it is clear that the workload is also causing more and more colleagues to fall ill, resulting in a high absenteeism rate. In their opinion, the pay is also too low. The four employees are therefore hoping that the wage negotiations between Swiss Post and the trade unions will take place next year - and that conditions will improve.