Budleigh mail pick-up point rejected

[TrueBlueTerrier]

http://www.exmouthjournal.co.uk/news/bu ... _1_4523855" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

A former Budleigh Salterton postie has revealed she offered a life-line service to save residents having to travel to Exmouth to collect their post.

Pat Prew, who now runs The Card Shop Too, in High Street, offered the shop as a possible place for people to collect undelivered mail once the sorting office closes.

Royal Mail announced that its Budleigh premises will close on Monday (May 9), moving all operations to Exmouth. The company had also said it had been unable to secure a ‘local’ solution for delivery pick-ups, meaning residents may have to travel five miles to get their mail.

Pat said she offered the card shop as a possible pick-up point, but the idea was rejected.

She said: “Royal Mail told me it is not the policy because Exmouth is only five miles away. We’re open seven days a week, we have room and we even have a lockable safe.

“We are quite willing to put this service on for the people of Budleigh.”

Royal Mail had confirmed that it is providing a free re-delivery service to an address in the same EX9 postcode for anyone not at home when the postal worker calls.

Town mayor Courtney Richards believes a pick-up point would be a ‘win-win’ situation.

He said: “It would be a good idea if Pat is willing to do it. If someone does want some stuff delivered to Budleigh, to have a pick-up point would be quite a useful facility.”

A Royal Mail spokesman said: “We are aware that a local business offered their premises to provide a collection service for first-time undelivered Royal Mail items to customers in Budleigh.

“In order to maintain the integrity of our mail service, we are unfortunately unable to accommodate this offer.

“We would like to remind customers that Royal Mail offers several options for mail delivery, including redelivery on a more convenient day, delivery to neighbour or designated neighbour and redelivery to another agreed address within the same postcode area.”

[datasaint]

“In order to maintain the integrity of our mail service" ... sorry but how is delivering to neighbour any safer than this? A neighbour can be unknown to the recipient and can deny ever having taken the packet.

Ultimately I think it comes down to cost and practicality, the business owner might ask for a fee in the future, it might close unexpectedly, and where would you write on the 739's that it's there.

[wannabeek]

This happens regularly in distant rurals out this way. I don't really see any security difference between delivering a parcel to a random neighbour or to a nearby shop. Many of those new 'nominate a neighbour' cards simply say on them, 'at the village shop'.

I would imagine that RM could not make this place an official pick-up spot for some legal reasons, probably to do with statistics of thefts from shops against thefts from houses, but an informal arrangement such as this would be acceptable.