OREANDA-NEWS The authorities have offered to lease part of the offices of the Russian Post in major cities. Kommersant reports on the found source of financing of unprofitable branches with reference to the Ministry of Finance.

Optimization of Russian Post offices will become an alternative to the collection from marketplaces that has been discussed for several months. The Ministry of Finance proposes to close offices in cities with a population of more than 10 thousand people, where there is already an infrastructure for the delivery of goods and delivery of parcels, chain stores and bank branches. The income from the rental of premises and the saved costs are proposed to be used to ensure the work, repair and modernization of offices in villages. The agency collects possible proposals from the regions until December 1.

Alexander Khinshtein, a member of the Board of Directors of the Russian Post, head of the State Duma Committee on Information Policy, called the new method of financing unreasonable. Instead, he proposed to increase the joint turnover with marketplaces (delivery of orders by the postal operator — approx.) or infrastructure payment.

Despite the fact that most of the Post offices that may be closed are located in a residential area and in close proximity to consumers, they are of little use for renting. According to Andrey Lukashev, partner of the ILM consulting company, "some of the branches are in a very dilapidated condition" and require significant capital expenditures for repairs.