Heavy rush at head post office

Serpentine queues outside the Srikakulam head post office has been the order of the day for the last few years. This is because of the gross failure of the officials concerned to arrange additional counters to improve services to consumers.

Many of the postal services are available only in the head post office, forcing consumers to depend on it despite inordinate delay in services. Senior citizens and women are the worst victims as they have to wait for longer time. Almost all services are provided from a single counter, including the postal insurance services, causing lot of inconvenience to consumers.

Contrary to the ‘any service within minutes’ claim by the department officials, it takes at least 45 minutes to send a speed post, registration of a parcel or a money order. As per the citizen’s charter displayed at the office, normal registrations and speed post bookings must be completed within five minutes, insured parcel booking in eight minutes and money order service in five minutes.

It takes over an hour if a job notification is published by the department. Unemployed youth throng the post office for postal orders and other services.

“People are afraid of visiting the head post office as it eats into a major part of their day’s schedule. At any given point, at least 15 persons are seen in a queue. Naturally it will take 35 to 45 minutes even if the work is done at maximum speed” says K. Seshasai, a resident of Visakha-A Colony.

“Vexed with the poor services at the post office, many people now rely on courier agencies,” says K. Satyanarayana.

Head Post Master P. Lakshmana Murthy attributes the delay to technical snags and staff crunch. “Many consumers prefer to use services in the head post office, causing heavy rush during peak hours. We request them to use services in sub-post offices also. It may take some time before we start additional counters here,” he says.

Source : http://www.thehindu.com/news/