The big difference between Japan post offices and Italian post offices

Hello. I love Poste Italiane (Italian Post Office) dearly. This time, I will write about the difference between the Japan post office (Japan Post) and the Italian post office (Poste Italiane) that I learned after studying abroad in Italy.

Italian post offices allow SIM contracts

At the post office in Italy, you can sign up for a SIM (mobile phone number). It’s a service called PosteMobile, and I use it too. My plan costs about 7 euros (1000 yen) a month, unlimited calls and SMS, and allows me to use 100GB of internet. It will be a high fee even overseas, but you can use it. Therefore, I do not have a Japan cell phone number. That’s how comfortable PosteMobile is. If you are abroad and do not use it, you can receive cashback up to 4 euros. The fee will be credited directly to your Postepay account. Postepay is a prepaid card by the Italian Post Office. Japan post offices also issue debit cards. Debit cards at Japan post offices are very useful because there is no annual fee. It is inconvenient to use it overseas because you need to pay a high fee. You can also sign up for car insurance and internet access (WIFI for your home) at the Italian post office.

At the post office in Japan, you can leave 5 minutes after entering

At post offices in Italy, you will generally have to wait for at least an hour. In urban areas such as Milan and Rome, it can take up to 3 hours. However, as the Italian post office wrote earlier, it does a lot of things, and many people use the service because they can also pay taxes and receive pensions. It can be said that it is a service that is needed and loved by many people. However, in Japan, taxes can be paid directly from the Internet or using dedicated opportunities at the bank, so there are not so many things that can only be done at the post office. For that reason, there is not much need to stand in line at the post office in Japan, and you can receive service in an extremely short time, from entering the post office to leaving the post office in about 3 to 5 minutes. The service at the Japan post office is fast and there is not much waiting time. We provide efficient service. When I asked an Italian friend who is studying abroad in Japan what he thought, he said, “I liked it very much because it was fast, comfortable, and courteous.”

Italy’s post offices are fashionable in design and you can enjoy sightseeing

The Italian post office welcomes us with its very sophisticated and elegant design. The theme colors are yellow and blue, and those two colors are often used inside. There are about 12,500 post offices in Italy, each with its own personality and design that blends into the landscape of the region. Compared to the post office of Japan, the design is different one by one, so you can enjoy it as a sightseeing (post office tour). And most of all, there is no poster inside the post office that spoils the landscape, so it fully enhances the elegance of the design. I think the post office in Japan is “chaotic and uneven.” Of course, this is what makes the post office so lively and vibrant, and I don’t want it to disappear. The Italian post office can be described in one word: “simplicity within elegance.” Despite the simple design of yellow and blue, it has an elegant atmosphere, a sense of heaviness and beauty.

At a post office in rural Italy, employees and customers sometimes chat.

Not only in Italy, but also in the countryside, there is often a strong sense of solidarity where all residents feel like family. You often know your friends’ friends, and you may feel that “all the friends of your friends are friends.” There may be such a tendency in Japan, but in Italy it is especially pronounced “chatting between employees and customers”. For this reason, some customers may ask us to “work quickly without chatting.” If the chat lasts for minutes instead of a minute, or if you’re busy with a lot of errands, you may find yourself frustrated when you see employees chatting. But I love Poste Italiane like that. This is because we believe that it is “customer service with warmth like a human being”. Time flows slowly, and by valuing interactions between people, and feeling the affection of caring and cherishing yourself, you will want to use Poste Italiane’s services unnecessarily.

Japan post office has a lot of posters.

At Japan post offices, there are many stickers on post boxes and post office windows. Whether it’s for promotional purposes such as “buy this,” or just decorating, or just a combination of colors, fonts and designs, it’s pretty chaotic. However, it is not an exaggeration to say that the poster is the symbol of the post office of the Japan. The vibrant, promotional, and energizing design is complex and chaotic for those who prefer architecture and interiors, but at the same time it feels vitality. There are no such posters in the Italian post office, only a beautiful flyer at the window. Italian post offices have a simple and minimalist design, but at the other end of the spectrum is the Japan post office.

For those of you who want to work at the post office

If you want to work for an Italian post office, your high school graduation grade must be at least 70 out of 100. Or, your college graduation grade must be at least 102 out of 110. Of course, it is more advantageous to have a university degree. Therefore, the fact that only the elite can work maintains the quality and politeness of the service of the post office. In the case of Japan post offices, since it is possible to work even after graduating from junior high school (compulsory education), the enthusiasm to work is not rejected by the standard of educational background, and we hire people who have various backgrounds and will to work.

In Italian post offices, there are not many people who proceed to permanent employment with a contract for a short period of time of about 6 months at first. As a result, many people can work as a side that provides great services for the post office, but it will be difficult to produce professional personnel. In the case of Japan, long-term employment is relatively easy and part-time work is also possible, so it is possible to let one person gain a long time of experience, so that professional services can be performed. The former can reward the love, service spirit and enthusiasm of many people for the post office, while the latter can make a small number of people more highly educated.

Japan has a culture called “New Year’s cards”, and postcards are sent to each other on January 1 every year. Therefore, at that time, you have a chance to work part-time at the post office for a short time. This is because a large number of postcards are delivered to a large number of people, which is said to be 10 percent per year, so it is difficult to deliver and sort them. So, if you’re reading this article and you’re interested in a Japan post office, I think it’s worth trying a short-term part-time job around January 1st. Good luck!!