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Postal Services
Deutsche Post AG is a recently privatized part of the former state-controlled Deutsche Bundespost, and it is striving to be more customer-friendly. It is modernizing its services, locating post offices in convenient places and offering more attractive opening hours and friendlier service.

It has also established a subsidiary, Deutsche Post Express, to compete with other express services, and has acquired an interest in one of those services, DHL. In other moves the company has bought out a third segment the former Bundespost, the banking service, offering deposits, withdrawals, savings accounts and cheque cashing. It has also acquired the discount stationary chain McPaper, and is now in the process of covering the country with 550 strategically placed McPaper stores with postal counters.
Mail service is prompt and efficient in Germany. The goal is to have a Brief (letter) mailed in the afternoon arrive the following morning anywhere in the country, although this is not guaranteed! Most packages can be delivered within a 400-kilometer radius in one day and nationwide within two days the process of covering the country with 550 strategically placed McPaper stores with postal counters.
Post offices were by tradition the places where you went to make phone calls, and the service is still available at many post offices. There is a charge of €1 plus the normal charges for each call they place for you. As just about any kind of call, including overseas, can now be made from phone booths, placing calls at the post office is no longer a wise practice. They will, however, sell you a card that you can use for making your own call at a booth.
Germany pioneered the idea of the postal code (Postleitzahl) way back in the early sixties, and the world imitated it. Under the current system, all addresses have a five-digit code, and letters are directed not just to cities, but to certain parts of cities as indicated by the postcode.
Full charging rate information can be obtained from any post office by requesting the free brochure "Product Preise", or refer to their website:
http://www.deutschepost.de/postagen (English section of their website).