Saturday 31 July 2010

The post office and I are just never going to get along

I wonder if you remembered, or even noticed, that a year or two back there was a lot of post office closures. The ones that weren't making much money got closed or scaled back. Anyway, one of the fatalities was the Glasgow High Street post office, which for me was situated conveniently just a few doors up. Let me describe this place. It was a small, basic postoffice. It had a few things for sale including all the packaging/envelopes as well as drinks, snacks and wee travel things like nail clippers etc. It had a passport photo booth, a cash machine and the two post office windows. You would queue up in a straight line, waiting for either of the windows to be free and if you saw something in the shop bit you wanted on the way down you just took it up when you went to the window. I usually bought these cola bottle sweets made by this company, Lady Bird Confectionary. They were great. Anyway, the main thing that was great about the post office was there were two people who always worked there, two men, always quite nice and quick to serve you. Also it was never crazy busy (I guess why it closed which is a shame). I liked this post office. This post office liked me.

So it was closed. I discovered this driving down the street one day to my dismay. The next time I had to post something (ebay probably) I had to go online and search for the next nearest post office. This post office is the Glassford Street post office in Glasgow and it is a whole world away from my cosy village-esque branch. Firstly this one is nearer the city centre so it is busier. It is very very busy infact and it is a small place and its always packed especially at lunch time. It resides right up the back of a newsagent type shop. A few words on the nature of this shop. This isn't a newsagent like you expect. A comparison here serves to illustrate my point. I went to the post office in the West End where my brother lives, the one on Dumbarton Road. Inside I found helpful staff, short waiting times, advice, an orderly queue & pleasant members of the public. This post office was also part of a newsagent. At the west end post office the main product they have on show as you enter is Yankee Candles. At my post office it is Buckfast and obscene brass(esque) models of gay men "embracing" eachother. They also have a heterosexual one and it is even more repellent. The shop is PACKED to the gunnels with stock, most notable being many, many of those hallmark birthday cards with things like "to my favourite brother's wife's best friend's cousin who is 9 today and named joe" and a long soppy and pointless "poem" on the inside spanning 4 seperate pages, thus making it a pamphlet rather than a card. They also sell Tourist items such as magnets with famous London landmarks on them. In glasgow. yes. The most annoying thing about the whole shop is that, while you are waiting in the packed place to get served you do see some things that you want to buy such as all the postage items (string, manilla envelopes and other EXCITING stationary) but there are notices allll over (on those neon coloured stars, obviously) with "pay at shop, not post office" on them. By this point you have already waited for 10 minutes in the queue and will be damned to go to the shop counter at the other end of the place. I've never bought a single thing from that shop.
So, moving on to the post office itself, well actually before you can even see the post office you have to queue in a ridiculously cramped in and out barrier system. Inevitably you are pushed together with the other "people" who use the post office. I guess the people who used to go to the High street branch started using fedx because the people in this one are definately more "big n' pretty" at the trongate than crabtree and evelyn in princes square. If you have ever taken the time (oh yes, there is one thing that is in abundence at the post office) to look at these underclass type people they are either A) obese and wearing the wrong clothes for it, B) gaunt and junkie-ish to the point that they look like corpses or C) very very old and probably humming/whistling some elvis song. Those from Category A are way too big for the barrier system and take the barriers with them as they advance to the front. The Bs usually smell of pish, or BO or shit or eau de pish or something you do not want near you and you are always next to them in the line. The oldies have NO perception of what personal space is and basically have their chins on your shoulders and often like to comment on the thing you are posting. "ohhh! careful with your parcel hen, dont want to knock someone out he he he he".
Anyway here we are we made it through the barrier system and the people and we are at the counter. This is where the long wait becomes obvious seeing as there is never more than 3 people serving, more often its 2 and 1 is always in the bureau de change bit. You realise this bit, which also is used at the post office, has a seperate queue so you could have spend the 25 mins in the queue of death or actually walked straight up to the bureau counter and been like "ehhh £1 worth of euros? oh you cant? well while im here i have this package to post..." This usually causes fights between those in the long and short queues too which is fun. The people serving are awful though. Apart from the bureau guy they are all women, they are all about 50 and they all hate the world and everything in it starting with parcels, stamps and post office customers. NEXT! Asking for something that isn't "ukfirstclassnoproofofpostageexactchangebye" puts them out big style and then their day is ruined. chances are 20 other people already ruined it before you got there so you are screwed from the get go. I have had some success though, you would think I would get more pissed off and snooty the more I get this response. In fact this is the common response, for example, I was in 2 days ago and there was a woman who had to wait 15 minutes in the queue (don't know why she was so pissed, thats decent for the place). Anyway she was standing there with a huffy look on her mug and shifting from one foot to the other, hand on her hip, sharply exhaling every few seconds. "HUUHH". "HUUUUUUH". "HUUUUUUUUUUUH-HUH!". The reason was becuase some silly goose decided to fill out his road tax at our post office and it was taking all 3 members of staff a long time to work out how this was done. Anyway she was served soon enough and she plonks her package on the scale, waits for 2 seconds then grabs it off. "I'm sorry I need to weigh that" says the woman serving. "HUUUUUUH" she goes and whacks it back on. It is posted and the receipt is given; "heres your receipt thanks see you later, bye". As the woman walks past the queuing people on her way out she says "cheeky bitch" in that schemey way. WHO WAS SHE TALKING TO???!?!?! no-one, her own ego, thats who. drama queens at the post office. she must be a really important person. Yea so now instead of being dramatic or pissy I challenge myself to make the women serving smile. I make myself sick. "Heeeeeeyy! Uk first class plleeeease, will i just pop this wee parcel on the scale? ok, on it goes heehee!! Is that it done? Here i'll pass it through... YOUR WELCOME!!!" *grin manic-like*. I swear, it has started to work, the other day one of them said thanks - SCORE!

So thats the post office. I deal with it passive-aggressivley now and i hate the place with every fibre of my being and if I have to go in again I will probably have a breakdown and start pulling the queue barriers down and smash the bureau glass. But maybe I will just remember the 57p of profit I am making on the item I am ebaying and having to make an extra trip to that god forsaken hell hole for as the buyer didnt pay for another day, and I will be happy, and try to make the post office women crack a slight smile. Fingers crossed.

5 comments:

  1. ahh I too have had to experience that delightful post office on a few occasions. I just did what you did despite the queueing etc. and was ultra polite. I quite liked the post office on St Vincent Street when they made it that you didn't queue you just went to a computer selected the service you required and took a number...so efficient :)

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  2. :O really? wow computer post office sounds like heaven! I'm gonna go there, its only like an extra 5-10 min walk each way so It'd be quicker than waiting in the post office anyway! thanks! if you weren't in newcastle i'd suggest we post at the same time, you know, safety in numbers! :P xx

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  3. also the staff are pleasant or at least the ones I've experienced have been very friendly and helpful :)

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  4. I agree - St Vincent St has improved vastly in recent months since they got in the computer / self service machines. Waiting time has been cut massively (sure I once waited as long as 45 minutes to post something from there) and the staff are less stressed and so more pleasant.

    I've used the Glassford Street one once - once was enough

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