I have received the following letter from the Post Office:
16 July 2015
Dear Mr Redwood
Spencers Wood Post Office®
Basingstoke Road, Spencers Wood, Reading, RG7 1AD
Changes to your Post Office® – tell us what you think
We’re talking to the Postmaster about making some changes to the above Post Office and we’d like you to tell us what you think about the changes before we finalise our plans.
What’s happening?
There’s an exciting programme of investment and transformation taking place across the Post Office network, helping to make our branches more modern and convenient for you and for the Postmasters who run them. We’re talking to the Postmaster about changing to one of our new-style local branches and if the change goes ahead:
• Post Office services would be offered from a low-screened, open plan style service points, integrated into the retail counter
• The branch would be open for longer: Mon – Sat 09:00 – 20:00 & Sun 11:00 – 17:00. (Current opening times are: Mon – Fri 09:00 – 17:30 & Sat 09:00 – 12:30)
• You’ll still be able to get most of the Post Office products and services you’re used to however for a small number of services you may need to visit an alternative Post Office, go on-line or, telephone our customer helpline. Details of product availability are provided overleaf
• To get the new branch ready, it may need to close for up to seven days during September/October 2015 for refurbishment
What’s next?
We want to know what’s important to you and would like you to tell us what you think, particularly on the following areas:
• Why you use this Post Office and what you like about it
• What you think about the proposed new-look Post Office. For example the Post Office service point would be on the retail counter, so is there anything you’d like to ask us or would like us to take into consideration about the proposed location of the Post Office till or the queuing area
• What you think about any changes to the opening hours
• If you have any comments about how you will access the Post Office products and services that won’t be available at the branch if the change goes ahead
• If you have any comments about the potential closure period during the refurbishment or access to other branches in the area
There’s also a list of frequently asked questions provided at the end which you may find useful.
It’s easy to let us have your feedback by completing our convenient online survey via the following link postofficeviews.co.uk and entering the unique code for this branch 12393999
Customer information materials are also being displayed in branch and details are published on our website too at postofficeviews.co.uk
We’ll be accepting comments up to and including 14 August 2015.
You can also let us have your comments in the following ways:
Please note that items sent by Freepost take 2 working days to arrive and don’t include Saturday or Sunday. Therefore please do allow sufficient time for your comments to arrive before the end of the consultation period, as we are unable to consider feedback received after the deadline.
We won’t be responding to you individually however the feedback received will be taken into consideration as we finalise plans with the Postmaster. We’ll write to you again outlining the main comments received and our response to these and also to explain the final plans for the branch. All of the responses received will be provided to the independent statutory consumer watchdog, which in Great Britain is Citizens Advice and Citizens Advice Scotland, and in Northern Ireland, the Consumer Council.
When would the changes happen?
We’re planning to make these changes in September/October 2015 and we’ll put a poster up in branch at least two weeks before to let customers know the exact date and to tell them how we’ve considered the feedback. We’ll make sure any disruption caused by the refurbishment is kept to a minimum.
The following branch will be happy to provide customers with Post Office services during this period.
• Three Mile Cross Post Office, Basingstoke Road, Three Mile Cross, Reading, RG7 1AT
We’ll also be asking customers for their feedback once the changes have taken place and details will be available in branch shortly after the new look branch opens.
Yours sincerely
David Gold
Area Manager