Royal Mail extends delivery office opening hours

After 375 years and the invention of the postage stamp and pillar boxes, the Royal Mail has come up with a new idea: letting people collect parcels outside of office hours.

From today more than 200 delivery offices will open until 8pm on a Wednesday, to allow those at work who missed deliveries to collect them. A further 350 offices will join the programme later in the summer.

Royal Mail said that by the end of the summer 650 delivery offices will open until 8pm on Wednesday and until 2pm on Saturdays. The extensions will go some way towards easing the frustration of customers who complain they are unable to collect parcels taken to their door while at work.

Mike Brown, Royal Mail's fulfilment director, said: "This investment by Royal Mail will help people who are not at home during the day to receive their item in cases where it is too big to go through the letterbox or needs a signature." The extended opening hours are part of an attempt by Royal Mail to move into the modern world, following the ending of a strike by postmen last year over the impact of a modernisation programme.