Householders in Bicester are becoming frustrated over delays and long waits for post from Royal Mail.

A number of eager would-be recipients of letters and parcels in the town, including a councillor, have taken to social media to air their grievances at not getting their post in time.

District councillor for Bicester South and Ambrosden Nick Cotter said: “My wife and I had been away in Madrid for four days, and when we got back we noticed no post had arrived, which is unusual for us.

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“This is itself was not much of an issue, but some time after getting back we’d gone to use our credit cards and both got declined.

“Tesco bank had sent out new cards for us on September 28 but they hadn’t yet reached us. This is quite concerning.

“I’ve also had someone reach out to me saying they received a letter inviting them to an important medical appointment, which they missed because the letter arrived far too late.”

It appears from public comments on Mr Cotter’s social media posts on the issue, that householders in Kings End, Bure Park and Glory Farm have been receiving their post late too.

Catherine Betterton, who lives in Glory Farm, said: “I was told by a postman that the Royal Mail don’t have anyone to deliver mail in our close.

“We wait two to three weeks at a time for our post.”

Another householder in Langford, Adele Cadd, said: “It’s an absolute joke in Langford to get post at the moment.

“It took me 13 days to get a birthday card.”

Mr Cotter went on to describe a conversation he had with his postman.

The councillor said: “My postman told me the issue goes up to high management regionally.

“He said management had employed 12 agency employees in the run up to the summer period to help out around Bicester.

“They were then kept on for a couple of months. But, all 12 were released from service at the same time.”

Mr Cotter said the poor postal workers around the area just don’t have enough staff to do the job, they’re running ragged.

He added that his postman is extremely worried about the upcoming Christmas period, because unless Royal Mail take on more staff in the area they won’t be able to cope.

The postman told Mr Cotter that workers are so disgruntled and overworked, that staff can’t be retained or hired at all.

A Royal Mail spokesperson said: “We are committed to restoring our quality of service to our customers.

"We have plans in place and dedicated teams responsible for improving deliveries in Bicester and throughout our delivery offices nationwide.

“Over the last six weeks we have recruited around 3,000 postmen and women and are continuing to recruit around 500 permanent positions a week in delivery. 

“In the lead up to Christmas, we are taking on 16,000 temporary workers, more vehicles and additional parcel sorting sites to handle double the normal volume of parcels we expect over the period."

 

 

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This story was written by Matthew Norman, he joined the team in 2022 as a Facebook community reporter.

Matthew covers Bicester and focuses on finding stories from diverse communities.

Get in touch with him by emailing: Matthew.norman@newsquest.co.uk

Follow him on Twitter: @OxMailMattN1