History
The first Postmaster of New South Wales was an ex-convict, Isaac Nichols, who took the post in 1809 operating from his home in George Street, Sydney. His main job was to take charge of letters and parcels arriving by ship, to avoid the chaos of people rushing onto the ships as soon as they arrived at Sydney's wharves.
The Postal Act of 1825 allowed the governor to fix postage rates and appoint Postmasters outside Sydney, enabling the first organised postal service.
Postal services grew throughout the Australian colonies as they were established.
A regular Sydney-Melbourne overland service began in 1838, as did embossed covers (the world's second, after William Dockwra established the London Penny Post in 1680) prepaid postage, and by 1849 uniform postal rates were established by agreement between the colonies. Monthly steamship sea mail to the United Kingdom was established in 1856. The separate colonies joined the Universal Postal Union in 1891.
In 1901, the colonial mail systems were merged into the Postmaster General's Department (or PMG). This body was responsible for telegraph and domestic telephone operations as well as postal mail. The world's first large-scale mechanical mail sorting system was introduced in Australia (according to Australia Post), and operational in the Sydney GPO in 1967. This coincided with the introduction of the current system of 4-digit Postcodes in Australia.
On 1 July 1975, separate government commissions were created to undertake the operational responsibilities of the PMG. One of these was the Australian Postal Commission, trading as Australia Post. It later changed its name to the Australian Postal Corporation on 1 January 1989 when it was corporatised, although it still trades as Australia Post.
Under amendments to the APC Act that came into effect in March 2008, quarantine inspection officers from a prescribed state or territory are authorised to request Australia Post to open for inspection packets and parcels sent from interstate which they believe may contain quarantine material. The legislation also authorised Australia Post to remove from the mail stream articles that are suspected of being scam mail.
On 26 June 2009, Australia Post celebrated its 200th anniversary.
Read more about this topic: Australia Post
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