Telegrams will cost more for curtailed service

Press, 12 September 1986, Page 1

Telegrams will cost more for curtailed service

Telegrams will cost more to be delivered by the Post Office from September 29, and telegraph offices will no longer be open after 5 p.m. The Postmaster-Gen-eral, Mr Hunt, said that with the declining use of telegrams the service had been running at a loss and could no longer be subsidised by the profitable telecommunications service. From September 29 inland telegrams would not be handled outside the hours of 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., nor at week-ends or on

public holidays. Public telex service (telex boths, telex and phonatelex messages) and the facsimllie service would also be available only between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays. International telegrams and radio telegrams to ships may continue to be lodged outside the new hours, by telephoning the usual number for telegrams. It will cost 50c more to have a telegram delivered by post; $1 more for a telegram to be deliv-

ered by telephone, to a telex number, or a telegraph code address; and $5 more for a telegram addressed to a business or residential address for delivery by the fastest means practicable, including messenger delivery, and for inland money order telegrams. “A large part of the cost of providing the service is for delivery, and the new fees are an attempt to recover some of this cost, according to the means of delivery necessary in each case,” Mr Hunt said.