Post offices in peril

The Dorset village of charmouth is set to lose its post office after 224 years – not due to declining popularity but because its existence conflicts with management dogma.

Post office ltd has decided that traditional stand-alone post offices like this one offend its precious ‘network transformation’ plan. Accordingly, hundreds of branches across the country could be downsized and rehoused in nearby shops – or closed.

charmouth is sited on the ‘Jurassic coast’, renowned for its dinosaur fossils. Now, its post office is facing extinction, depriving 1,300 people of a service that has endured since 1795.

even in the age of e- commerce, village post offices are not dinosaurs. They are the beating heart of community life, with a value way above that expressed in balance sheets. Post office ltd should think again.