The key legislation in the Netherlands for PostNL’s activities is the Dutch Postal Act 2009. This Act, along with the Postal Decree and Postal Regulation, sets among others the requirements for the Universal Service Obligation (USO). By separate decree PostNL is the designated provider of the USO in the Netherlands.
In July 2017, the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs published a report on the future of the Dutch postal market, concluding that maintaining an affordable, accessible and qualitatively good universal service will become challenging due to the ongoing mail volume decline. The report will serve as input for a long term policy analysis of the Dutch postal market.
On the basis of this report and on the request of the State Secretary for Economic Affairs and Climate Policy, Mrs. Oudeman has conducted a dialogue on the postal market. As a result of the outcome of this dialogue on the postal market and several independent reports, the State Secretary sent her conclusions and recommendations vis-à-vis the future of the postal market to parliament on 15 June 2018. These recommendations will be the basis for a policy and legislative agenda that will guarantee affordable postal services in the future.
PostNL is subject to various laws and regulations, both national and international. In addition to the Postal Act 2009, these are, among others, the Competition law and the Data Protection Law. Furthermore there is an independent Disputes Committee, in line with the EU 2015 Alternative Disputes Resolutions Directive, that handles disputes between PostNL and customers that cannot be resolved by PostNL’s own procedures.
