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A North East post office has reopened this week with a new owner more than a year after it closed, devastating those in the community.
Holywell Post Office in Whitley Bay, North Tyneside, has reopened in the same spot after new postmaster, Priya Pichaimuthu, took control Tuesday this week after successfully applying to reopen.
Holywell had remained shut since the site’s previous postmaster tendered their resignation, in June last year.
Post Office Network Lead, Gail Burnett, said: “We are delighted to have restored Post Office services to Holywell as we know how important a Post Office is to a community. The opening hours will also make it very convenient to visit.”
The site will be open 8am-8pm Monday to Saturday, and 9am – 5pm Sunday, and provide 80 hours of service each week.
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It will offer the same range of services it had before it closed and a spokesperson said its new weekly hours are for customer convenience.
The company has the largest retail network in the UK with 11,500 branches, more than all banks and building societies combined.
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But it comes as a report published by charity group Citizens Advice in January this year found 1,291 post offices were temporarily closed in September 2021.
It also found one in three rural post offices in Britain are now part-time and are open on average for 5 and a half hours a week.
The research found provision is too infrequent, opening hours are inconvenient, queues are too long, and vital services are missing.
The Post Office has said it works with over 30 banks, building societies and credit unions including Lloyds, Santander and HSBC and says 99 per cent of its customers can access their accounts via their local Post Office.
Nearly 67 per cent of the British population have a Post Office within a ten-minute journey of their home, and 38 perncetwithin a ten-minute walk, according to research from consultancy firm Public First.
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