Nearly half of people who contact MaltaPost do so to lodge a complaint, a survey by the Malta Communications Authority found.

Although the company received fewer complaints in total than when the survey was last held in 2016, its handling of grievances appears to have worsened. 

In 2016, 15 per cent of complainants said they were not satisfied with the company's response to their problem. That number has now leapt to 54 per cent.  

Conversely, the share of complainants happy with the way their problem was handled has dropped precipitously. In 2016, 71 per cent of complainants said they were satisfied. In 2018, 21 per cent were.

Although 74% reported being satisfied with MaltaPost’s overall quality of service, this was still 20 percentage points lower than in 2016.

Complainants made up seven per cent of all the people surveyed. Of those, 45 per cent said they did so to complain. 

The Household Perception Survey, carried out in July and August 2018, confirmed that demand for postal letters has continued to fall, with online shopping boosting volumes of packets and parcels. 

The most common complaints related to loss of mail (46%) followed by delay (17%), and misdelivery and failure to attempt delivery (a joint 14%).

The authority said 42% of respondents said they had spent less than €5 on posting articles in the last 12 months, as against 28% in 2016.