A Lossiemouth woman’s campaign to spare the town’s Royal Mail delivery office from closure has been backed by more than 1,500 residents.
Fran Mitchell is pressing firm bosses to reverse a decision to relocate the High Street collection point to Elgin, as it will leave residents facing a 12-mile round trip to pick up items.
Yesterday, Ms Mitchell revealed that petition papers she had circulated around town centre businesses had attracted more than 1,000 signatures in 10 days, and said an online campaign has been backed by 530 people.
She implored Royal Mail top brass to visit Moray to listen to residents’ concerns firsthand.
Ms Mitchell said: “I’m aware that I’m a small fish in a big pond when it comes to going up against Royal Mail, but I’ll go down fighting if I have to.
“I’m prepared to do anything I can to save the delivery office, and I want Royal Mail management to attend a public meeting in Lossiemouth to learn just how unhappy people are about this.”
Royal Mail claims it is not physically possible to continue the delivery office in Lossiemouth.
A spokesman said: “We are aware of the views of the local community on the decision to relocate the Lossiemouth delivery office.
“Unfortunately, we are unable to offer a collection point for customers in their local post office due to restrictions on space and no other option is available to us.
“The current delivery office is not fit for purpose for our people or our customers, who currently pick up undelivered items from a hatch on an outside wall.”
The firm stressed that it offers a free redelivery service, six days a week to the customers’ address or another address in the same postcode, which means residents will not have to personally travel to Elgin to collect items.