A BRIGHTER future for Post Office services in Whitstone is expected following the launch of a new service in the village stores.

There will also be a post office service in Week St Mary.It is hoped the partner outreach service — which opened this week in Whitstone Village Stores — will improve access to postal, payment and banking services, following the recent closure of local sub post offices.

The partner outreach service will be available for 39 hours a week and will offer access to the post office card account for pension and other payments; as well as personal banking, bill payments and postage services.

The new service opening hours are longer than those that were offered by the former village sub post office, which closed last week as part of a nationwide Network Change programme.

Proprietor of Whitstone Village Stores, Daniel Cock, said: "When we had a sub post office the counter hours were only around 20 per week but the new service is now available until 5pm four days a week. The new service will close early on Wednesdays and Saturdays and won't be available on Sundays, but we can now stay open on four weekday afternoons, which many of our customers have said is very important."

Customers won't have far to travel to find the new service. While the old sub post office counter at the rear of the shop is now in mothballs, a new partner counter is open at the front of the store. The service is run in partnership with the main post office in Bude.

"We are entering entirely new territory by delivering a very familiar post office service in a new way," said Daniel. "Whilst the closure of our stand-alone post office is the end of an era, we see the new partner outreach service as an opportunity to allow this essential facility to thrive."

"The alternative would have been a mobile service, which was heavily opposed by local people. Our task now is to safeguard the future of the partner service and we ask our customers to continue their fantastic support by keeping it as busy as possible," he added.

Whitstone and Week St Mary Post Offices will now be run as a partnership with Bude General Post Office.

Bude Head Postmaster, Luke Francis said: "A large number of Post Office services are available at the sub post offices, ably run by Dan Cock and Geoff Roberts at Week St Mary enabling local residents to access pension payments, posting and other post office products in their local community instead of the harsh closure of other branches.

"I'm delighted we are able to provide a service to the rural areas of Week St Mary and Whitstone, ensuring the post office remains in their villages, and I am only disappointed at the unfortunate closure of other rural post offices in our area and that we were not able to partner more."