Card contract ‘will save 200 Welsh post offices’
HUNDREDS of post offices across Wales were handed a lifeline yesterday when the Government decided to allow the network to continue to provide the Post Office Card Account (Poca).
Postmasters last night estimated that about 200 of Wales 800 branches could be saved by the decision.
The accounts are used by an estimated 4.3 million pensioners across the UK who use the cards to pick up benefits. They drive vital business through small rural branches.
Work and Pensions Secretary James Purnell yesterday announced the Post Office would continue to run the account until 2015 and scrapped a tender process in which it had faced competition from a rival firm.
Mr Purnell said it would be wrong to risk the future of post office branches at a time Britain faced recession.
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