Keep Our Posties Safe

Posties play a very important role in the lives of all Australians; they deliver over five billion articles every year and visit around 1,000 different letterboxes each day. Each year a large number of posties are injured whilst going about their daily deliveries.

There are a number of simple things residents can do to keep your postie injury free including, taking care whilst entering and exiting your drive-way, ensuring your letterbox is maintained and positioned correctly, keeping your dog secure and by being more vigilant on the roads.

Dog Attacks

Each year posties are attacked by dogs while they are delivering mail, which can cause serious injury. To keep your postie and the community safe, Australia Post is urging residents to ensure their dogs are secured safely behind fences.

Australia Post provides training and advice to its staff on canine behaviour and management to minimise the risk of attack.  However, it is also up to the dog’s owner to make sure that their dog is secured safely behind their fence and not a threat to either the postie or other footpath users.

When posties are routinely threatened by a dog, Australia Post writes to the owner to inform them of the problem and if it persists, we will then notify the local council ranger of the issue for further investigation. Dog owners have special requirements under each state government law to ensure their pet is under control when in public. The owner of a dog that attacks a person can be subject to severe penalties including the animal being destroyed.

Letterbox

Posties visit over 1000 different letterboxes every day.  Something as simple as the shape, size and condition of your letterbox, could pose a danger and make a big difference to the safety of your postie.

We can all help reduce postie injuries caused by unsuitable letterboxes by ensuring your letterbox:

• is free from overhanging branches and overgrown trees and shrubs
• is on the boundary of your property or on the fence next to your driveway or in a similar position
• property number is clearly displayed
  is the correct height of 900mm to 1200 metres from the ground
• is at least 230mm wide (left to right), 330mm deep (front to back), 160mm high (from top to bottom). It should be capable of fitting an A4 size envelope all the way in and have provision for local newspapers.
• should be lockable to help prevent identity theft
• is free from any sharp or dangerous edges.

Look Out When Backing Out

Your postie is on the move throughout your neighbourhood every day of the week delivering your mail as quickly and efficiently as possible. Driveway accidents are a constant concern for our posties as they go about delivering their rounds. Serious accidents can unfortunately happen, even at very low speeds.

You can help keep your postie safe by remembering the following easy steps when leaving your driveway:

• reverse slowly at all times
• check your central and rear vision mirrors
• turn you head to check that there is no-one in your blind spots
• trim bushes that may obscure your vision in your driveway
• sound your horn briefly before reaching the footpath.

Road Accidents

Although posties undertake regular and rigorous safety training to deal with the unpredictable hazards and ever changing conditions of our roads and footpaths, a large number of incidents still occur and most are preventable.

Our records indicate that a large percentage of all motorcycle related incidents occur on Mondays and Tuesdays between 10am and 2pm with some states recording a higher incident rate in the afternoon period.

It is up to all of us to highlight to the community in general that posties are out delivering mail five days a week and there is a need for an awareness that posties can be vulnerable if all road users are not “looking out for them”.

Some of the high frequency and more severe motorcycle incidents are caused by:

• reversing cars from residential driveways
• on road collisions when the public “don’t see” the postie 
• entering and mixing with traffic in roundabouts

So please talk about this to your friends, and help raise public awareness for your local postie’s safety.

• see our Annual Reports