RSb Registered Mail in Austria: Who Can Accept It

In Austria, RSb registered letters can be accepted by a third party holding postal power of attorney, while RSa letters can never be accepted by anyone except the recipient in person. For business owners who travel or live abroad, this single distinction decides whether official mail reaches them in time: 1010 Works accepts RSb mail under power of attorney as part of its Premium plan at 129 EUR per month plus VAT with annual billing. Last updated June 2026.

What are RSa and RSb letters?

RSa and RSb are the two classes of official registered mail used by Austrian authorities and courts, both delivered against signature. The difference is who may sign.

• RSa, blue envelope: personal delivery to the recipient only. No employee, no service provider, no family member may accept it.
• RSb, white envelope: delivery against signature, where substitute recipients or holders of postal power of attorney may also accept.

Tax assessments, administrative decisions and official notifications typically arrive as RSb. RSa is reserved for documents where personal receipt matters most. If you run an Austrian company, you will see both, and each carries deadlines.

Why can no service provider ever accept RSa mail?

Because personal delivery to the recipient is a legal requirement for RSa, and no power of attorney changes that. If the postal carrier does not find you, the letter is deposited at the post office and a notification slip goes into the mailbox. The critical part: a deposited RSa letter counts as delivered when the pickup period begins, and any deadline in the document starts running from that day, whether you collect it or not.

This gives you a simple test for address providers: anyone promising to accept RSa mail for you is making a promise the Austrian postal system does not allow. The honest version is that RSa letters get deposited and you need to be informed immediately so you can react within the deadline.

How does postal power of attorney work for RSb letters?

A postal power of attorney authorizes a named person or provider to accept RSb mail and other deliveries on your behalf. At 1010 Works the process looks like this:

• You subscribe to the Premium plan and sign the power of attorney
• We register it, and from then on we accept your RSb letters at Seitenstettengasse 5/37, 1010 Vienna
• You receive the content as a scan and see immediately which deadline is running
• You collect the original any day of the week or have it forwarded anywhere in the EU

For founders managing an Austrian company from abroad, this is the missing piece between a registered address and actually staying on top of official correspondence. Combined with mail forwarding from Vienna, nothing depends on you being in the country.

What happens to an RSb letter when nobody can accept it?

It is deposited at the post office and counts as delivered when the pickup period begins, even if you never learn about it. Objection periods and payment deadlines start running from that point. This is where the expensive cases come from: missed appeals, missed payments, enforcement steps that could have been avoided with a two-line reply sent in time.

An unattended business address is therefore a real liability for official mail. A staffed address with registered power of attorney removes it: someone authorized is always there, and you are notified at once.

Which plan includes RSb acceptance?

Only Premium, at 129 EUR per month with annual billing or 149 EUR monthly, plus VAT. Basic (49 or 59 EUR) and Plus (79 or 89 EUR) handle your regular business mail, but the RSb power of attorney is exclusive to Premium. Premium also includes unlimited scanning, EU-wide forwarding and 4 hours of meeting room use per month. All plans are cancellable monthly, and the location has handled business mail since 2015. The full comparison is on the pricing page.

Conclusion

The rule of thumb: RSb can be delegated with postal power of attorney, RSa never can. Deposited letters count as delivered when the pickup window opens, so the way your mail acceptance is organized determines whether deadlines are met. With the Premium plan at 129 EUR per month, 1010 Works accepts RSb mail at a real first-district address, scans it the moment it arrives in the workflow, stores the original for pickup seven days a week and forwards it across the EU on request. Official mail becomes a process instead of a risk.