Posties to the Rescue-

Living Alone the Postie is a Friend

There are 8,000 postal workers in Scotland in Scotland and in the future they aren’t only expected to be mail deliverers, the posties are set to be on the frontline role in tackling loneliness. They will be asked to check on older residents and pass on the info to local charities and the like to counter loneliness. Other plans include encouraging GPs to send lonely patients on cookery courses or to join art classes or ramblers’ groups. Naturally behind the really smart idea is another impulse which is to cost less.

 A Postie to Dig Your Garden?

Posties work with lonely or elderly will be done voluntarily, with older people on delivery rounds invited to sign up to participate. But we are behind in this with other European countries. They have used their postal workers to offer support to lonely older residents in rural areas for some time. In Normandy, France, the state-owned postal company offers a service for €20 a month in which you get  a postie’s visit for a coffee and chat for half an hour each week. In Finland they’ll dig your garden! The Finnish national post service offers its postal workers as “outdoor buddies” who can take elderly customers for a walk, or do their garden. The service costs €17.25 for a 30-minute stroll on the arm of the postie.  I’m no fan of charge for stuff, but it seems like a nice thing to have happen to an elderly person living in isolation.

Festive Postbag Looms

But we are getting towards the busiest time of year when millions of cards, letters and presents are being sorted across Scotland as postal workers deal with their busiest day of the year. Planning for the Christmas rush starts in May and soon Royal Mail staff will be working 24 hours a day, seven days a week to sort the festive postbag. Did you know the Glasgow Mail Centre, about 2.7 million items of mail are sorted on the busiest day along with hundreds of thousands of parcels, the result of the surge in online shopping. So I’ll be reminding you to shop a little bit earlier and give the poor old postie a bit of a head start in the rush. He or she will have their hands full sure enough. And if you are a little short of copper bottomed gift ideas the try this selection of Xmas themed goodies. I’ll be wearing my Christmas themed Tunnock’s apron as I make the family lunch.

https://www.jamespirie.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=christmas