Stop-gap home found for Wigan's post office as WHSmith closes

A temporary new home has been found for Wigan town centre's post office.
WH Smith in Wigan closes on December 4WH Smith in Wigan closes on December 4
WH Smith in Wigan closes on December 4

This Saturday (December 4) the WHSmith store on Standishgate closes its doors for good, bosses claiming it wasn't viable to keep it open.

And while that adds to the general sadness at Wigan' s declining retail scene, it has presented an imminent problem as well.

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Since the old GPO closed on Wallgate several years ago, Post Office Ltd's presence has been within the WH Smith store.

An empty unit in the Grand Arcade will acommodate the post office temporarilyAn empty unit in the Grand Arcade will acommodate the post office temporarily
An empty unit in the Grand Arcade will acommodate the post office temporarily

And the hunt is continuing to find a permanent new home. But in the meantime the company has been looking to find somewhere it can set up shop over the next few weeks and months.

And today it announced that an empty unit in the neighbouring Grand Arcade will be used for the time being and will open at 9am on Monday December 6.

Two counters will be operating at the outlet - Unit 10 and the opening hours will be remain as Monday to Friday: 9am to 5.30pm; Saturday: 9am to 2pm.

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Sarah Cottrell, Post Office network provision manager, said: “We know how important a post office is to a community and we are pleased to announce plans for a temporary post office that will open shortly after the closure of the existing branch.

"We have pulled out the stops to get this branch open in time for the busy Christmas period.”

"This temporary service will be provided by an experienced postmaster and his team.

"This postmaster has also successfully applied to be the permanent postmaster and plans for a permanent post office elsewhere in Wigan will be announced next year."

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Customers are warned that some services will not be available at the temporary location for instance the AEI machine for driving licence renewal, passport check and send and foreign currency.

All of these services will be available at Robin Park branch.

Post Office says that when the new permanent branch opens next year the full range of services will be available.

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