Revision of Financial Powers for “Heads of Postal Divisions” – reg.

 

To,

            The Director General,

Postal Services,

            Dak Bhawan, Sansad Marg HO,

            New Delhi 110001.

 

No:- CHQ/POA/22/2021-23                                                                              Dated 09.06.2022

Sub:-  Revision of Financial Powers for “Heads of Postal Divisions”  – reg.

Respected Sir,

            On the subject above, it is humbly brought to your kind notice that Financial Power of officers of the Department of Posts of “Head of Circles “and “Head of the Departments” was recently reviewed and enhanced in order to meet the escalation in cost of various items by IFW Wing of Additional Secretary & Financial Advisor duly approved by the Secretary, Department of Posts vide OM No. 6-1/2021. Fin. Cord dated 30.07.2021 which was revised after 13 years but the Financial Powers of “Head of Postal Division” is still to be reviewed/revised.

2.         It is pertinent to mention here that there are several items which has supposed to be supplied by Head of Postal Division to their subordinate offices of the Division either Postal or RMS and also necessary to run subordinate offices/post offices since at present no financial power is vested with executive staff up to the level of Postmaster HSG-I or HRO/SRO/In-charge Mail Office/TMO etc.,. The details of the some of the items are as under:-

 

Sl.No	Name of Item	S.No	Name of Item
(i)	Computer Paper-A-4	(iii)	Laser Jet Printer
(ii)	Office Stationery	(iv)	Boards

 

3.         The financial powers of Heads of Postal Divisions are detailed in Schedule III of Directorate OM No. 6-1-2008-FC [Posts] dated 06.02.2009. The same in respect of purchase of equipments& consumables connected with Computer & other equipments was revised to Rs.15,000 in each case vide Directorate OM of even no. dated 30.08.2016.

            The financial powers for Heads of Postal Division may be revisited on the following category of expenditures:-

 

Sl No.	Item of Expenditure	Extent of Financial powers delegated	Revision suggested
4.	Contingent Expenditure [non- recurring]
	(a)   Non-recurring contingent expenditure, powers for which are not provided for specifically.	Rs.5,000/- in each case.	Rs.25, 000 in each case.
	(b)   Embedding of cash / mail chests, purchase of technical books/maps, painting of Letter Boxes, sign boards, notice boards etc	Rs.5,000/- in each case.	Rs.10, 000 in each case.
5.	Contingent Expenditure [Recurring]
	(c)    Renting of buildings for office use	Without FRAC:- A1 & A city-Up toRs.5,000/-per month B1 & B2 city-Up toRs.4,000/- per month Other cities-Up toRs.3,000/- per month	Without FRAC:- A1 & A city-Up to Rs.15,000/-per month B1 & B2 city-Up to Rs.12,000/- per month Other cities-Up to Rs.15,000/- per month
	(e)    Replacing, repairing, cleaning, oiling, shifting,  purchase of spare parts for repairing, for electrical/light fittings, fan, air and water coolers, typewriters, instruments, minor equipments & apparatus, including electric stencil cutters(duplicating machines) telephone instruments, photocopiers, fax machines, franking machines etc.	Up to Rs.2,000/- in each case.	Up to Rs.10,000/- in each case.
	(f)     Repair of boats, bicycles, mopeds, motorcycles, 3 wheelers, tricycles, handcarts	Up to Rs.500/- in each case	Up to Rs.5,000/- in each case
	(g)      Maintenance of gardens	Up to Rs.1,000/- per month in each case.	Up to Rs.2,500/- per month in each case.
	(i) Advertisement charges for calling tenders for mail contracts, buildings etc, and advertisements of products, services and initiative of the Department.	Up to Rs.5,000/- in each case through DAVP	Up to Rs.10,000/- in each case through DAVP
	(j) Hiring of accommodation for holding examinations and for other purposes e.g. holding customer meet etc.	Rs.5,000/- in each case.	Rs.10,000 in each case.
	(l)   Hot and cold weather charges	Up to Rs.5,000/- in each case	Up to Rs.10,000/- in each case
	(m) Emergent purchase of articles of stock & stationery not ordinarily available in the stock	Up to Rs.50,000/- per annum after obtaining Non-Availability Certificate from PSD concerned.	No limits, subject to non-availability certificate from PSD concerned.
6.	Repairs of Buildings
	(a) May sanction petty per annum per departmental building	Up to Rs. 10,000/-	Up to Rs. 25,000/-
	(b) May sanction annual or special repairs/maintenance expenses to Departmental buildings - per annum perbuilding	Up to Rs.15,000/-	Up to Rs.40,000/-
	(c)   May sanction petty works/special repairs/maintenance expenses in rented building	Up to Rs.2,500/- only per rented building per annum in each case	Up to Rs.7,500/- only per rented building per annum in each case
7	(i)  May Sanction expenditure on carriage of mails by modes other than rail and air transport	Up to Rs. 1,000/- per month in case.	Up to Rs. 5,000/- per month in case.
	(ii) May sanction temporary arrangement for conveyance of mails without calling tenders	Up to Rs. 5,000/- in each case for a period of three months only	Up to Rs. 50,000/- in each case for a period of three months only. Most sections are now functional mails and exchange through RTN or Local Arrangement.
8.	Write-Off
	(i)  May write off value of spoiled/damaged postage/recruitment stamps	Up to Rs. 1,000/- in each case not exceeding Rs. 50,000/- per annum	Up to Rs.5,000/- in each case not exceeding Rs. 50,000/-per annum
	(ii)  May write off articles of dead stock, used up equipment	In all cases where original price of stock was not more than Rs.1,000/- subject to an overall limit of Rs.50,000/- per annum.	In all cases where original price of stock was not more than Rs.5,000/- subject to an overall limit of Rs.50,000/- per annum.
9.	Miscellaneous
	(a) Printing of rate charts, mailers, brochures and other material required for publicizing the products, services and initiatives of the Department – and distribution to post offices, marketing executives and customers	Up to Rs.10,000/-per annum for all activities taken together	Up to Rs.10,000/- in each case.
	(b) Holding of customer meets: preparation folders, hiring/transport of equipment/staff, tea/coffee/other soft drinks &snacks, and other activities necessary for conducting customer meets	Up to Rs.5,000/- for each meet with a ceiling of Rs.1,000/- on hiring, Rs.100/- per head on tea, snacks etc. and Rs.50/- per head on stationery and ancillaries	Up to Rs.10,000/- for each meet with a ceiling of Rs.3,000/- on hiring, Rs.150/- per head on tea, snacks etc. and Rs.100/- per head on stationery and ancillaries
	(c) May provide to members of staff undertaking any activity that facilitates marketing of products/services or initiatives of the Department:	Per annum per person:- i)Visiting Cards-Up to Rs.500/- ii)Reimbursement of cell phone charges-Upto Rs.4,000/- A maximum of ten persons in a Class-I division and six persons in Class-II division	Per annum per person:- i)Visiting Cards-Up toRs.1,000/- ii)Reimbursement of cell phone charges-Upto Rs.6,000/- A maximum of ten persons in a Class-I division and six persons in Class-II division

 

Justification for revision of Financial powers:-

1.      The financial powers on non-recurring contingent expenditure were lastly revised in 2009 and in many cases; there is a necessity to revise the same in present scenario.

2.      In respect of recurring contingent expenditure, huge numbers of building cases are pending in each Division. Due to increase in cost of construction and land value, no building can be secured within the financial powers now available.

3.      In respect of printing of advertisement brochures, the ceiling of Rs.10, 000 is fixed per annum, which is very less compared to availability of various products in the Department. Advertising materials needs to be purchased locally for SB/BD products and ceiling per case may be fixed instead of restricting it to expenditure per annum.

4.      There is no supply of A4 Papers, RBT labels, L Bag labels etc in many PSDs and many Divisions are forced to procure them through GEM locally. Hence powers need to revised in respect of Emergent purchase of articles of stock & stationery not ordinarily available in the stock, subject to non-availability certificate from PSD. If PSD can’t supply such items and they issue non availability certificate, the Heads of Divisions have no option other than to purchase and supply to the offices under his control.

5.      In order to run the subordinate offices, the Postal or RMS Divisional Head unnecessarily has to split the requirement in order to purchase the items within the Financial Power of Rs. 5000/- whereas the requirement is higher than ordered on GeM. Since, at present items are being purchase from GeM, thus, the enhancement of Financial Power will not any adverse effect on the ground of misuse of Financial Powers by the Postal Division Head.

6.      This  can be more elaborate by an example as noted below :- If RMS Division has 5 Sorting Mail Office at a distance of 150 KM each with a radius of division as 500 KM and each office has 3 Set round the clock, in that case, the requirement of A-4 Paper is as under :-

 

S.No.	Name of Items	No of offices	No of set	No of Bags to be closed in each set [L-1,L2, NSH, ICh,PL-1 and PL-2	No of A-4 is required in a day due to SAP  Software through Printer	Total A-4 required in 30 days0	Paper in one bundle	Total Bundle Required
1.	A-4 Paper	05	03	1000	15000	450000	500	900

 

      [i]         Cost of One Bundle : Rs. 180 with 75 GSM

      [ii]        Total Cost of monthly supply: Rs. 180x900= 1, 53,000/- Per Month

     

      This is an example only and there are so many items, which have to purchase

by the Divisional Head by regularly in order to run the subordinate offices smoothly.

 

                                         

 

 

 

Humble Prayer

               In view of the facts & circumstances as mentioned, it is requested to kindly look into the matter personally and takes necessary action into the matter as may deemed fit for enhancement of Financial Power of “Head of Postal Division”.

              We hope the views/suggestions as submitted are in order and will be considered positively.

                                                With profound regards

                 Yours Sincerely.

 

                                                                                                                              (Rajiv Kumar)

                                                                                                                           General Secretary

                   Postal Officers Association.