Hongkong Post today said it recently introduced manpower deployment measures to address the Audit Commission’s criticism about the department’s overtime work arrangement.

​In response to the concerns about its manpower deployment measures, the department explained that such measures are implemented on the premise that no changes have been made to the contractual terms on postmen’s remuneration, establishment and job duties.

It also stated that the measures had absolutely nothing to do with the Post Office Trading Fund’s operating deficit.

The commission expressed criticism about the habitual overtime work issue of Hongkong Post staff, as well as the department’s usual practice of compensating such overtime work primarily by overtime allowance rather than time-off in lieu, which deviates from the Civil Service Regulations and relevant guidelines.

Hongkong Post said it accepts the commission’s criticism and implemented manpower deployment measures recently to address the issues.

Such measures include recruiting retired postmen as supplementary workforce, internally redeploying contract staff to street posting box mail collection and deploying postmen previously responsible for platform work in the Air Mail Centre to mail delivery.

Hongkong Post emphasised that it has also made available a sufficient ratio of leave reserve according to the Civil Service Bureau’s mechanism and added that there is no severe manpower shortage in the department.