Post Office Ltd.

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Post Office Ltd (Welsh: Cyrchwr Codau Post) is a retail post office company in the United Kingdom that provides a wide range of products including postage stamps and banking to the public through its nationwide network of post office branches.

Post Office Ltd logo

1 Structure
2 Services
3 Concerns
4 The Post Office in Wales
5 See also
6 External links
- 6.1 Articles

[edit] Structure

Post Office Ltd was separated from the postal service Royal Mail in 1986 but remains a wholly owned subsidiary of Royal Mail Group plc. A large number of its branches are under franchise agreements.

There are currently around 14,000 Post Office branches across the UK.

[edit] Services

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The Post Office in Oxford, UK

The Post Office a wide variety of services in all its branches in the UK including:

Mail services (Royal Mail services, stamps, Parcelforce Worldwide etc)
Personal banking services (Paying-in, Withdrawals, Bill payments and Balance enquiries) for certain banks and NSANDI only
Business banking services
National Lottery services
Mobile phone E-Top-up (including purchasing Top-up vouchers)
Processing passport, fishing licences, European Health Card, international driving permits and driver's licences applications
Providing some government department forms (for example, HM Customs and Revenue's R85 and R105 forms)
Selling and cashing-in postal orders
Keeping Post Restante mail (for up to 2 weeks for local mail and up to 1 month for international mail)
Insurance services
Home telephone services and telephone cards
Foreign currency exchange and Travel Money Card
Personal loans
Bill payments
Sales of gift vouchers for certain high street merchants
Sorted! magazine
Savings stamps
Keepsafe and redirections

Some Post Offices also have cash machines, most notably operated by Alliance and Leicester plc.

In towns, Post Offices are usually open from around 9am to 5pm on Monday - Friday and from 9am to 1pm on Saturday. In some country areas, opening hours are much shorter - perhaps only four hours per week. Post Offices are shut on Sundays and Bank Holidays.

[edit] Concerns

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The Post Office has been affected by closures in the last few years. This has caused much anger in local communities because the residents are unable to benefit from the postal and banking services that the Post Office provides.

It also increases business costs, as once the local Post Office has closed, people may have to drive some distance (perhaps five miles) to reach a Post Office.

[edit] The Post Office in Wales

The Post Office has recently opened up its services in Wales, providing services in Welsh. However, the services available in Welsh are still considerably fewer than those in English, causing criticism.^{[citation needed]}