Correos to hire 10,000 extra staff to guarantee the postal vote in Spain's general election on 23 July

The Spanish post office, Correos, is to hire around 10,000 temporary workers to guarantee the postal vote in the country's general election on 23 July.

The public company, according to sources involved in the negotiations, is close to reaching an agreement with trade unions for an "unprecedented" mass recruitment. The aim is to ensure that the hundreds of thousands of people who are expected to use postal voting in the upcoming summer elections can make their applications on time.

At first, Correos offered to hire 5,500 temporary staff, a figure that was rejected by the trade unions, who asked for 12,000 contracts. For the last local and regional elections on 28 May, some 2,600 people were hired, although few permanent staff had holidays planned then in contrast to the July date.

The contracts, in principle, will run until the end of July, covering the main milestones of the postal vote. Correos expects an avalanche of work in its offices between 3 and 13 July. During that period tens of thousands of postal voters are expected, as those who are still applying for the vote (possible until 13 July) will coincide with those who have already received the ballot papers at home and exercise their right to vote in the offices (from 3 July). In addition, thousands of postmen will have to deliver the envelopes and ballot papers at homes and in person.

The management of postal voting includes the admission of applications (online or in person), their delivery to the provincial delegations of the Electoral Census Office, the hand delivery of the electoral documentation sent by the Census to the applicants, as well as the admission of the postal vote and its safe keeping until it is delivered on polling day at the corresponding polling station.

Correos also plans to set up dedicated counters for elections to speed up customer service, if the demand requires it. The network of offices already has 533 digital devices to speed up customer service in the offices with a high number of postal votes.