Three weeks left to use your Post Office savings stamps

[TrueBlueTerrier]

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The Post Office is urging holders of £1m worth of savings stamps to scour their drawers and purses for them now, because they will not be able to spend them after the end of this month.

From March, the stamps, which were used by many people to save for household bills, will no longer be accepted at Post Office branches. Instead, customers will have to send them to a central office for checking.

The savings stamp scheme, reintroduced in 2004, was described by the then Post Office chief executive, David Mills, as a "jam jar" for people who find paying bills difficult.

Savings stamps were first introduced by Henry Fawcett, Postmaster General between 1880 and 1884, but were phased out in the Sixties. The new stamps, which don't earn interest, can be redeemed at up to £500 a time until the end of this month. They can also be put onto a new plastic card at Post Office branches until then.

A Post Office spokesman said "Since May 2010, we have been actively advising customers in our branches that the savings stamps scheme is being replaced by a new budget card. This offers even greater security and convenience in budgeting for bills. A core principle for us is that if customers have any savings stamps, this money will always belong to them. Until February 28, customers can continue to use savings stamps to pay their bills in Post Office branches."

The spokesman said the card was more secure because customers can have savings reinstated if they lose it, provided they pay a £5 fee.

The Post Office budget card is operated by Bank of Ireland. However, unlike the rest of the Post Office products run by the bank, it is still protected under the Irish deposit scheme, meaning that if the bank went bust savers would have recourse to the Irish scheme, which may be less robust for British savers than the British Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). The Post Office's other products are protected under the FSCS because they are operated by a UK subsidiary of the bank.

The Post Office also runs a Christmas club, which also pays no interest, although it says that it provides a bonus in the form of a booklet of "special offers" for savers.

Many other savings stamps used for paying household bills have been phased out, including TV licence, water and car road tax stamps.

"If you have not redeemed or exchanged your savings stamps by the February 28 2011 expiry date, your local Post Office branch will no longer be able to accept them," the spokesman said.

"Instead, we will ask you to send the stamps to a central Post Office location where we will validate the stamps and arrange for their value to be returned to you in the form of a Post Office payout letter," he said.

[stokes11eg]

Memories! in the fifties, our rich Aunts used to send us a half crown saving stamp for christmas. With five of us it came to a tidy whack, and Mum would borrow it, and never pay it back! but my, for a short time we felt rich! Instead of phasing them out, they should reintroduce a savings scheme aimed at young kids!!

[blue1873]

Memories! in the fifties, our rich Aunts used to send us a half crown saving stamp for christmas. With five of us it came to a tidy whack, and Mum would borrow it, and never pay it back! but my, for a short time we felt rich! Instead of phasing them out, they should reintroduce a savings scheme aimed at young kids!!

Memories indeed Stokesy it is still a lifeline for a lot of
folk today particularly elderly people who often don't have
a bank account to pay by D/D or S/O but sadly in this
obsessively electronic age the business world has decreed
that saving stamps and cheques are too time consuming,
everything has to be done in a hurry nowadays....why...
beats me, to use modern terminology they need to CHILL
As you say "memories"