Call to bring back more Post Office counters to Crawley's neighbourhood parades

Currently, only nine of the town’s 14 neighbourhoods house a Post Office.

Concerns have been raised that this has impacted trade for the other businesses on the parades as people head into town rather than shopping closer to home.

During a meeting of the borough council’s overview & scrutiny commission on Monday (September 5), Alison Pendlington (Con, Pound Hill South & Worth) asked what could be done to encourage some of the traders on the parades to open a counter.

Richard Gammie, the council’s senior asset surveyor, said the Post Office was of the opinion that the branch in WHSmith, County Mall, was ‘sufficient for the local area’.

But he added: “However, we are looking at a number of options to try to bring a Post Office back to a number of parades inside another shop unit.”

Mr Gammie said the idea had been discussed with a number of tenants who were concerned that taking on a Post Office counter would not be profitable.

So the council now has to look into whether the Post Office itself is could help with the problem.

He added: “It’s something we’re very, very aware of and are trying to work a way round bringing post offices back where we can.”

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