Bromham Post Office closes as owners say it didn't pay

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Bromham Post Office closes as owners say it didn't pay its way

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BROMHAM Post Office closed today just 16 months after moving into the village shop but the Post Office has said it will only be temporary.

Owners Adrian and Thea Dunn say they were forced to act as they have not been able to make it pay.

Mr Dunn did not want to comment further on the situation other than to say that the village shop will stay open as normal.

A Post Office spokesman said: “We can confirm that Bromham Post Office closed due to the resignation of the postmaster.

“We would like to apologise for any inconvenience caused by this temporary closure and we would like to reassure customers that we are committed to maintaining a service in the area.

“In the meantime customers can access Post Office products and services at the nearest alternative branch which is in Bath Road, Devizes.”

The Post Office was not able to confirm when or where a new Post Office would be opened.

It relocated to Bromham Stores, in The Chantry, in February last year after being previously in New Road run by David Price for 16 years, before he retired last January.

Speaking in May last year Mrs Dunn said: “Business at the Post Office has been really slow. People don’t seem to know it’s moved. The shop is subsidising the Post Office and we have got the Post Office on a year’s contract and if at the end of the year it’s not been worthwhile we will say it’s got to go.


“The Post Office isn’t making anything; the shop is holding it up at the moment. The Post Office has to be viable. It cost us personally a lot of money to put in the Post Office facility in the shop.”

Pat Bryant, who ran as the UKIP candidate for North Wiltshire in May’s general election, has said a community post office should have been put in.

She said the Post Office put it in village shop on what they call a local post office on commission only,

whereas what they should have done is put it in as a community post office.

Mrs Bryant, of Springfield Road in Rowde, said: “A community post office is the last shop standing when there’s no other outlet for a couple of miles and they will give them community status and the postmaster would get a retainer and its subsidised by government. But because they put it in there as a local it gets no help.

“I think it’s shocking that Bromham is losing its post office, the next nearest is going to be Melksham or Devizes, so what are the old people going to do?

“It’s another one of our community facilities disappearing.”