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09
Feb
New solar-powered postbox headed for Harrogate town centre
An automated, solar-panelled system will replace Royal Mail’s traditional postbox on a main Harrogate road.
The postbox on West Park has been blocked up by black wrapping as it is transformed into an automated postbox as part of Royal Mail’s ‘postboxes of the future’ project.
The move, which was announced last summer, allows people to send and return labelled parcels up to the size of a shoebox through a postbox for the first time.
The new postboxes include a barcode scanner, which opens a drop-down drawer in which to place parcels that are larger than those that fit through the postbox slot.
People are still able to post letters at the new postboxes through a separate slot.
The scheme has been described as the biggest resdesign of the postbox in its 176-year history. Two are already in operation at Starbeck Post Office and Oatlands Mount Post Office.
Jack Clarkson, managing director of out-of-home and commercial excellence at Royal Mail, last year said:
We are all sending and returning more parcels than ever before. This trend will only continue as online shopping shows no signs of slowing, particularly with the boom of second-hand marketplaces.
There are 115,000 postboxes in the UK located within half a mile of 98% of addresses, making them by far the most convenient network of parcel drop-off points in the UK. Our message is clear, if you have a Royal Mail label on your parcel, and it fits, put it in a postbox and we’ll do the rest.
A 'postbox of the future'. Credit: Royal Mail
The Stray Ferret asked Royal Mail, which was taken over by a Czech billionaire last April, how long the West Park postbox could be out of action.
The company said the turnaround for the upgrades can take “several weeks” as each postbox is individually measured and the door is replaced.
The postboxes are wrapped to protect them from the weather or vandalism during the transition period, it added.
A Royal Mail spokesperson told the Stray Ferret:
Our postboxes of the future offer another convenient way for customers in Harrogate to access Royal Mail's services, alongside home delivery and collection, our Customer Service Points, Post Office branches, lockers and Royal Mail Shops.
We’re pleased to see positive feedback from customers in areas where the postboxes have already been introduced, and we hope that local residents will find them just as useful and convenient.
But the new postboxes proved less than popular with local postmaster, Andrew Hart, who operates post offices in Starbeck and Bilton.
Mr Hart last year told the Stray Ferret the new postboxes are an “attempt by Royal Mail to limit our post office revenue and threaten the future of not just Starbeck Post Office but every Post Office in the country".
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