Post Office rolls out new Drop & Go postage service across UK

- Drop & Go offers a fast-track postage service as research reveals a third of adults sell items on eBay

The Post Office has today announced the national roll-out of its Drop & Go service, which offers business customers and internet power sellers a fast track pre-paid card service when sending mail at over 10,000 branches.

Drop & Go has been launched in response to the ever-growing e-commerce market, with a recent study showing that 392 million items were sold on eBay in the past year – with a third of UK adults in on the action. The research also showed that 23 per cent of UK adults sell over 21 items per year through services such as eBay.

To help these small businesses and internet sellers, Drop & Go is being rolled out across over 10,000 branches, offering an efficient mailing option for customers who regularly spend more than £20 a week on postage.

Customers will be able to simply hand over mail at a fast drop counter at their local Post Office and swipe their pre-paid Drop & Go card, letting the Post Office team apply the postage on their behalf. The free-to-join service aims to save SMEs and regular mailing customers valuable time when preparing their mail for posting at their local Post Office.

Post Office Head of Mail Services Paul Brown said: “Drop & Go is part of the changes taking place across the Post Office network to make our services as easy as possible for customers to access our services. Other changes include transforming branches into modern retail outlets and offering longer opening hours to better meet our customers’ needs.

“Our branches are visited by over a third of the UK’s small businesses every week. These businesses play a hugely important role in our economy so we must make it as easy as possible for them to use our services.

“Drop & Go will provide a much quicker, simpler and more effective experience for these businesses, as well as frequent private sellers on the internet.”

Participating Post Office branches will have all the details of the Drop & Go service and can provide application forms for customers who wish to open Drop & Go accounts. The Branch Finder service at postoffice.co.uk can locate customers’ nearest participating branches with the help of the Drop & Go service search option.

The Post Office, now independent of Royal Mail, is the largest retail network in the UK, with over 11,500 branches.

It serves around 20 million customers a week, this includes a third of all small businesses across the UK. 99.7% of people are based within three miles of their nearest branch. For many rural communities, the Post Office is the only nearby retail outlet. Post Offices remain highly valued and trusted and are the focal point for many communities.

For more information, visit postoffice.co.uk

The Post Office has an unrivalled national network of over 11,500 branches across the UK, more than all the high street banks combined, and sits at the heart of communities across the country. The Post Office has made a commitment to no more branch closure programmes. It provides around 170 different services and products spanning financial services including savings, insurance, loans, mortgages and credit cards. Post Office also offers Government services; telephony; foreign currency; travel insurance and mail services.

Other research findings:

The research also showed that:

Of 1,435 adults polled, 445 adults have sold items on eBay in the past year

This equates to 15.1m adults nationwide, using 2009 census data, with the average number of parcels sent being 26

This means 392 million parcels are sent from eBay sellers

Online surveys of 592 eBay users revealed 23 per cent sell over 21 items per year

It also revealed that four per cent of sellers sold over 100 items annually, which equated to 184 million parcels

Contact - Post Office, Press Office