APPENDIX 8
Memorandum by Help the Aged
We understand that your Committee is undertaking
a brief follow-up inquiry into Royal Mail Group. Help the Aged
would like to take this opportunity to make a number of comments
in relation to your inquiry.
1. The Post Office Card Account (POCA) was
launched in April 2003 as an alternative for those who could not
or did not want to open a basic bank account when direct payments
of benefits were introduced. In some ways, the POCA has been a
major success and there are now around 4.3 million people receiving
their benefits via a Post Office Card Account, of which approximately
40% are pensioners.
2. Help the Aged are very concerned about
the impact the closure of the POCA will have on the post office
network. The move towards direct payments of benefits removed
more than £400 million of annual revenue from the post office
network. This has played a part in the resulting closure of 2,500
post offices.
3. The POCA contract is worth around £1
billion to post offices between 2003 and 2010. The decision to
end POCA will have a real detrimental impact on the long term
planning for post offices across the country. Further Post Office
closures will mean that vulnerable older people will have to increasingly
rely on ATMs, some of which charge for access to cash.
4. The Post Office faces a number of other
significant challenges, of which the end of POCA may be one of
the most significant. The other threats include:
— The doubt over the future of
the rural subsidy for the post office.
— Adam Crozier, Chief Executive
of Royal Mail arguing that that he could meet the criteria set
down for a full distribution of post offices with roughly 4,000
sub-post offices (there are presently in excess of 14,000).
— The proposal to set up 70 high
street offices to vet and interview applicants for passports.
— The Post Office potentially
losing its right to issue TV licenses.
— The Home Office decision not
to allow post offices to be involved in delivering passport services.
— The Department for Transport
not allowing some post offices to issue driving licences.
— Driver and Vehicle Licensing
Agency advertising to purchase of car registration online, with
no mention that it can still be bought at post offices.
We hope that you will consider these issues
during your evidence sessions. We would welcome the opportunity
to give oral evidence.
20 June 2006
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