please empty your brain below
My nearest priority postbox is named after a post office which no longer exists!

Tim W | 28.06.20 - 7:42 a.m. | #

This was inconvenient for me when I took the test last week as instead of a 1 minute walk to my local postbox, it was 10 minutes each way so I had to inform my boss I’d be out and make up the time.

The negative result was texted and emailed to me 24 and a half hours after I posted it, which is about as quick as I can imagine it will ever get.

Jimmy | 28.06.20 - 8:26 a.m. | #

The very thought of pushing something as deep into my nose as the diagrams show makes me feel ill. However if it's the only way then I'll just have to put up with it. Roll on spit tests (under development apparently).

If only the mail service could be run as a public service! What could we call it? Royal Mail, perhaps.

Malcolm | 28.06.20 - 8:42 a.m. | #

I would have thought the box nearest the Watford/Croxley Ascot Rd sorting office would be shown, the vans pass all day.

And they can't spell addresses. SCOTTS HILL post office (one T...)

NicK | 28.06.20 - 9:11 a.m. | #

Our local sorting office is currently closed because of a Coronavirus outbreak. Although "alternative arrangements" have allegedly been made, we've had no post delivered for 10 days. I'm not sure how you tell if collections are being made, now that Royal Mail have abandoned using (round here at least) those little metal plates.

2d53 | Homepage | 28.06.20 - 9:13 a.m. | #

Royal Mail were always strangely coy about the location of their postboxes - I think the third party sites based their information on FoI requests from before privatisation. I spotted the finder on their site the other week and just assumed that the 'priority' boxes were ones which still had end-of-day collections, and didn't realise there was a Covid-related reason.

This does solve a problem with the previous home testing system: you ordered a kit online, and it was delivered within 48 hours (by Amazon). You could then book a courier for the next day, but only up until 4pm - otherwise it would be the following day, and had to take your swabs from 9pm to 7am on the night before/morning of the collection. Getting rid of that potential extra day of waiting for a courier pickup reduces the time between ordering the test and getting it back to lab.

martin | 28.06.20 - 9:21 a.m. | #

Very informative, thanks; checking on my own corner of SW11, I’m pleasantly surprised to find that every single postbox, even the most hidden away, is shown as Priority, whereas this is clearly not the case in other areas. I assume this is because not every area has yet switched over to the Collection on Delivery scheme. We’re lucky here!

Phil C | 28.06.20 - 9:39 a.m. | #

Problem is, if you have symptoms, you're not supposed to leave the house for 7 days so that makes it very difficult to get to a postbox at all!

Peter Moore | 28.06.20 - 10:06 a.m. | #

I have to say that I was surprised at just how many priority postboxes there are, both where I live now (in a small country town), in surrounding villages), and also where relatives live in East London.

One *advantage* resulting from privatisation: the full range of post office services are now available in our local sub-PO (in a convenience store) for every hour the store is open: 5am to 11pm, seven days a week.

Dominic H | 28.06.20 - 10:11 a.m. | #

The PO website may have been updated. It now appears to show only priority boxes, not ordinary boxes. Hence someone seeing all boxs near them as priority?

dg writes: It never showed ordinary boxes.

ML | 28.06.20 - 11:04 a.m. | #

Surprisingly few Priority Post Boxes in my area, just the main Post Office one

Mikey C | 28.06.20 - 11:20 a.m. | #

At least two of the mobile testing sites in London allowed walk-ins throughout, although this info was only circulated locally if at all, and you had to cheat the registration form a bit. I cycled to Dalston in early May to ram the swab to the back of my throat and nose, and to relieve friendly military staff from boredom at the walk-in counter, which was totally free from custom.

Collections seemed to work fine from what I heard, but with the opening up, priority boxes may reduce quarantine times while waiting for results. Assuming people do quarantine themselves.

commonliner | 28.06.20 - 11:41 a.m. | #

Very interesting, not least that Royal Mail never used to offer a postbox location map. Why was that?
I'm slightly bewildered that I am within a 2-3 minute walk of 4 priority postboxes.

Will | 28.06.20 - 11:43 a.m. | #

In my part of suburban north west London the nearest priority boxes are a mile away, so mean a 2 mile round trip. You also have to walk past 2 other non-priority boxes on the way to either of them - how many people won’t realise you can’t use these ones and post tests in them?

Sarah | 28.06.20 - 11:59 a.m. | #

The evisceration of postal services — with staff and public penalised while senior managers take millions in bonuses, largely for dismantling the network— has been one of the worst excesses of the disgraceful privatisation regime. Just as with NHS (or rail and bus services) privatisation, the government has belatedly realised it needs a nationwide service for the public good when it has to deal with a national emergency, only to find that commercial operators are totally inadequate.

Having said which, the “Services near you” page on the RM website for my central London area, or those adjacent, doesn’t show a single post box (let alone priority ones), only post offices, despite being linked from the “Covid testing” page on the same site and asking for my full postcode. So much for public information.

Purview | 28.06.20 - 11:59 a.m. | #

I'm with Purview on that. No post poxes shown within2 milkes of Stanmore, only post offices and sorting offices.

Mike Roberts | 28.06.20 - 12:40 p.m. | #

We seem to be very fortunate!

The map shows 5 near us; the nearest one being just 100 yards away outside our local (sub) post office / convenience store.

John Simmons | 28.06.20 - 2:31 p.m. | #

Nearest priority box is apparently 5.5 miles away ... a very stuff walk over Buttertubs Pass.

Putters | 28.06.20 - 3:36 p.m. | #

I was very impressed with my testing experience. I booked a drive-through test, the whole time I was there I didn't see a single other 'customer'. Literally 10 hours later I had the result.

There's only 1 priority postbox in my town though.

timbo | 28.06.20 - 5:05 p.m. | #

I'm sure the residents of Vidlin in Shetland will be pleased to know their local postbox is a priority one. The last collection on a weekday is 0645 (but midnight on a Saturday!)

martin | 28.06.20 - 8:44 p.m. | #

And one final comment from me today - the Royal Mail mobile app has a postbox finder with every postbox, not just the priority ones.

martin | 28.06.20 - 9:36 p.m. | #

To Purview & Mike Roberts - Don't suppose you will come back and see this but, just in case you do, you need to click on the 'Priority Postboxes' tab. The page defaults to the 'Post/Delivery Offices' tab.

I have three boxes within five minutes walk and they are all designated as priority boxes. This week's game while out on daily exercise will be 'check which day the stickers arrive'.

Amanda | 29.06.20 - 7:46 a.m. | #

Thank you Amanda. I cannot find a "Priority Postbox" tab in my browser. I have just spent several minutes searching the Royal Mail web site for one. The "Services near you" page only has a Post Office tab

Mike Roberts | 29.06.20 - 9:11 a.m. | #

Amanda — unfortunately I second Mike’s comments. There’s no “priority postboxes” tab showing and ,when I used the search field on the RM website, it didn’t come up with anything but the Covid re-direction I outlined above. (I also knew the box database existed from work I used to do for a reseach company used by RM, but even then it wasn’t accessible unless you already knew the individual box code and you could never get a map of a whole area.)

Purview | 29.06.20 - 10:50 a.m. | #

My local council organise an occasional mobile testing centre where you can walk in with no car. It's aimed at key workers but apparently anyone can use it if you know when it's there and can book it online.

Kathryn | Homepage | 29.06.20 - 4:40 p.m. | #

Perhaps unsurprisingly, it's 4th July and no 'Priority Postbox' stickers have appeared.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 04.07.20 - 1:53 p.m. | #

Having just signed up for another test, I can tell you that there's a walk-in site on Rick Roberts Way (but the only appointments available were too soon for me to get there). If you sign up for a home kit, the confirmation email tells you your three nearest priority postboxes and their collection time.

martin | 09.07.20 - 3:25 p.m. | #











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