A7 Chaos / Problems with Procurement and Acceptance? 30% of Letters Cannot Be Recognized by New Machines
2026-06-07 00:00 United Daily News / Reporter Meng Jiamei / Taipei Report
Chunghwa Post invested over NT$20 billion to build the A7 Postal Smart Logistics Park, but since the "Northern Taiwan Mail Processing Center" inside the park began trial operations in early April, problems such as automated equipment malfunctions and severe mail processing congestion have occurred one after another. Senior employees have revealed that the A7 has been riddled with errors from the start, with newly purchased machines frequently breaking down and up to 30% of letters unable to be recognized, raising questions about procurement or acceptance issues.
Chunghwa Post Chairman Wang Guocai stated that the A7 is an important construction for the company's transformation into a logistics center. Planned since 2014, many people had high expectations for it. During the trial operation, some functions indeed did not meet expectations, and improvements will continue to address the machine recognition errors. Chunghwa Post said that to enhance operational stability, they have been promoting manpower supplements and cross-unit support. Currently, the main challenges are the coordination between equipment and operational flow, as well as the development of personnel proficiency.
The Northern Taiwan Mail Processing Center integrates the original Taipei and Taoyuan mail centers and handles letters and parcels for Taipei, New Taipei, Keelung, Taoyuan, Hsinchu, Yilan, Hualien, and outlying islands. Since April, there have been frequent delays in registered mail and parcel damage. Minister of Transportation Chen Shih-kai, Deputy Minister Wu Sheng-yuan, and Chairman Wang Guocai have successively inspected the A7, but the problems remain unresolved.
A senior employee at A7 pointed out that the misjudged letters from National Taiwan Ocean University were actually written very standardly. The same letters could be recognized by the old machines that had served for about 40 years at the Taipei Mail Processing Center before the merger, raising doubts about the procurement or acceptance of the new machines. When standard registered envelopes enter the machine, missing or blurred images often occur, causing 30% of letters to be unreadable. Among the 70% that are successfully recognized, some, like the grade reports from NTOU, have their send/receive locations misjudged.
The employee further revealed that the sorting machine for small registered parcels has only two cameras, requiring manual alignment of the parcel's send/receive field before machine recognition. Additionally, conveyor belts frequently jam packages. There was a case where a customer mailed a SIM card abroad, which got stuck on the belt and was rubbed until it burned, only discovered after a long time. Before the A7 merger, the company significantly reduced outsourced manpower. In May, when problems were discovered, they urgently recalled old manpower, but new hires and internal staff were put to work without training, leading to numerous errors.
Liao Nai-chen, Chairman of the Taiwan Postal Industry Union, said that the company merged the Taipei and Taoyuan mail processing centers without first confirming the A7's operation status. Now, after two months of trial operation, problems still abound, and a thorough review is necessary. Lin Rong-zhou, Chairman of the Chunghwa Post Enterprise Union, stated that the company assumed the new equipment would perform optimally immediately after installation. The miscalculation of manpower needs is the fundamental reason for the continuous problems at the A7 park.
