National mail carrier Posti has adjusted its operating profit for January to March this year to 12.6 million euros, up from 12.2 million euros a year ago, despite the ongoing coronavirus crisis.
The pandemic has, however, had a negative impact on state-owned Posti’s net sales figure, which decreased by about three percent to 384.2 million euros compared to January to March 2019.
A statement from the company revealed that the coronavirus pandemic only began to negatively impact business operations in March, with the parcel delivery branch of the business has benefiting from the growth in e-commerce. Nearly 13 million packages were delivered during the first quarter of 2020, compared to about 12 million over the same period last year.
Posti has also updated its outlook for the coming year, as the company expects revenues will decline due to the effects of the coronavirus pandemic.
Despite this, the company still expects a better overall result than last year, as 2019's figures were impacted by the three-week postal strike by workers in November.
The strike caused major delays and backlogs in the delivery of mail. The crisis eventually culminated in the resignation of then-Prime Minister Antti Rinne after his main coalition partner, the Centre Party, expressed a lack of confidence in the PM over his handling of a plan to lower postal workers' pay.