Shop Down Your Phone LineThe Beijing Municipal Post Bureau has recently bought dozens of green delivery trucks to support its newly developed service, telephone shopping, which was introduced this year, according to the latest issue of Beijing Review."As traditional business shrinks, telephone shopping is becoming one of the major developing trends for the new post services in cities," said Liu Baishun, researcher in the Business Development Dept. under the Post Bureau. The establishment of the new service is a natural response to the market's demand, explained Liu. Since traditional postal services are losing ground to the telephone and Internet, the post offices must find new ways to survive in the competitive market. However, market research has shown increasing demand of commodity delivery in cities. Thus, a commodity delivery center was established responding to market demand. Similar to shopping on the Internet, customers can call the Beijing Post Service Center��185 �� and dial 8 for the telephone shopping service to subscribe for a wide range of commodities, like Beijing Roast Duck, telephone cards, moon cakes, among others. The ordered goods will be delivered by post offices free of charge by express delivery. Besides telephone shopping, other new services focusing on improving convenience for local people have been introduced by post offices. These include insurance purchases, performance tickets sales, paying telephone fees. "Though we have the advantage of large post office networks, more efforts should be made in the development of new services and system reform to regain the market," remarked Liu. |
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