Last week, the European Commission launched a call for evidence on a “new EU Delivery Act” which aims at reforming the Union’s postal sector, notably by merging the Postal Services Directive (PSD) and the Cross-border Parcels Regulation (CBPR) into a single (likely to be) regulation. Ecommerce Europe is gearing up to prepare its answer to the call, exposing the views of European e-commerce on this initiative.
Why is the Commission considering this revision, and what can we expect from it?
Overview of the current postal regulatory framework
The EU postal framework of today includes the PSD and the CBPR. The PSD applies to mail deliveries (i.e., correspondence) and notably introduces a universal service obligation (USO) setting minimum delivery frequency requirements across each EU Member State. It also opens the postal sector to competition, and lays down rules regarding tariff, harmonisation, handling of user complaints, financing, etc. The CBPR applies to parcel deliveries and notably sets rules regarding regulatory oversight, tariff transparency, and rules to foster better cross-border parcel delivery services.
Less letters, more parcels: the shift of consumer behaviour
In the last years, the postal sector has seen drastic changes resulting from the increasing digitalisation of citizens’ and businesses’ behaviour. In the 2021 evaluation of the PSD, the European Commission outlines that “over the last two decades, […d]igital means of communication have been replacing paper-based ones, impacting demand for letters and leading to significantly lower volumes.” [1]
The consequences of this behaviour shift are striking. For example, in March 2025, PostNord, the postal service operator for Sweden and Denmark, made the decision to stop delivering letters in Denmark by the end of the year. The numbers accompanying this announcement speak for themselves: “letter volumes have decreased by over 90 percent since 2000”, states the postal services operator.
The 2021 PSD evaluation also details how the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the decline in letter volumes. Inevitably, this is accompanied by a loss of revenue for postal operators when sending letters. Concretely, it became harder and harder to maintain profitability for postal business models relying on mail delivery, overall leading to significant price increases over the years and a drop in delivery frequency.
This drop in letter volumes comes in parallel with the rise of parcel delivery resulting from the boom of e-commerce. The 2025 e-Commerce Report, co-published by Ecommerce Europe and EuroCommerce, illustrates this trend: in 2024, 72% of the 16 to 74-year-olds had bought goods or services online. The 2021 PSD evaluation outlines that, during the COVID-19 pandemic, parcel delivery increased from an average 9% growth per year to a 43% growth in the second quarter of 2020. In its 2021 Implementation Report of the CBPR, the Commission also notes the diversity of actors participating in the parcel delivery market, which includes “national postal operators, international express and logistic operators, operators with predominantly domestic presence and parcel brokers”. The sector’s rapid growth and the multiplication of various actors, many of whom have an international logistics structure, fostered innovation and digitalisation, as well as making services more transparent, affordable and sustainable.
In the context of these recent developments, policymakers are questioning whether the EU postal framework is still adapted to the new landscape. In its call for evidence, the European Commission identified the main challenges that the revision will have to tackle. In line with these, the new EU Delivery Act would have the objective of modernising the postal framework by ensuring universal access to postal delivery services, improving user protection, ensuring a level playing field among operators, supporting the development of cross-border delivery solutions and reducing the administrative burdens for businesses.
A new EU Delivery Act: possible regulatory directions
Beyond the baseline scenario, in which the framework would not be revised but only guidelines would be issued, three policy options are considered by the European Commission for this revision.
The first scenario would entail a limited revision of the PSD to tackle the shortcomings identified in the 2021 Evaluation, notably by providing flexibility for Member States to tailor postal services to national circumstances. There would be no revision of the CBPR.
The second option is to conduct a wider revision of both PSD and CBPR, and potentially, merge them into a single act. This act would aim at addressing the objectives under the first scenario while considering further reducing/eliminating the mandatory frequency of collection and delivery and the quality requirements for cross-border letters, as well as broadening the application of the sector-specific complaint handling mechanism.
Finally, the third and most ambitious avenue would also merge the PSD and the CBPR into one act, but go further in revising the scope of the EU postal framework to focus on goods delivery (including letters and mail). Although this option would entail achieving all the objectives of the previous scenarios, it would also include other elements, namely introducing a definition of the concept of postal delivery based on content, function and criteria other than form, while aiming to maintain a basic level of universal service coverage for only the most vulnerable users, and achieve a single market for delivery with at least one affordable cross-border delivery option from each Member State to another for all citizens and businesses.
Impact of the reform on the e-commerce sector
Overall, this reform will definitely have an impact on the e-commerce sector. With this EU Delivery Act, the European Commission aims to follow a consumer-centric approach by proposing a reform that captures the entire market. Besides the 2021 evaluations, the proposal might take on board some of the suggestions made by the European Regulators Group for Postal Services (ERGP), in its Report on the outline of the future regulatory framework. There is thus a possibility that online platforms with a vertically-integrated delivery service are scoped in the EU Delivery Act. Ecommerce Europe will contribute to the call for evidence, making sure that the voice of the European e-commerce sector is heard in this process.
[1] European Commission, Commission Staff Working Document Evaluation, accompanying the Report on the application of the Postal Services Directive, November 2021.