Wilmslow Park Post Office

As my local post office for three years, I used this place a fair bit. It is located at the back of the Londis shop, making it easy to combine with picking up a copy of the Guardian (on offer at the student price for everyone) or some chocolate digestives. The post office itself isn’t very nice to look at. There is an A4 sign printed out to warn you of just about everything the post office doesn’t do, or that you shouldn’t do in the post office.
Despite the fact that there is always a long queue at this post office, the staff are really helpful and seem to be patient with people who can’t speak English well or at all.
The annoying thing about this post office is that the post office shop is not actually a part of the post office, therefore if you want a jiffy bag or some parcel tape you have to queue up in the Londis queue and then queue again at the post office. I found this out the hard way (after putting the contents of my parcel into the Jiffy bag, writing on it and spending 15 minutes queuing at the post office), but later discovered that had I have read the A4 sign I would have known better.

Before the boyf and I did the Big Move In Together, it became clear that I had accumulated enough crap to sink a barge, and the boyf made it quite clear that despite our mutual love and respect, he would much prefer that our Big Move In Together did not include a box full of never-​used handbags, my Point Horror books or three ball gowns from my sikth-​form parties (I don’t know why the dresses and the books made it to Uni, let alone my post-​Uni dwelling, but they did, OK?) So, I realised, there was only one thing for it: eBay.
During what I like to term my eBay Months, I visited this post office around three times a week. I, too, was at first stung by the confusing queue-​here-​for-​this, here-​for-​that system, but once I worked out my arse/​elbow dilemma, I was right on track! The queue here can be massive around lunchtime, but it shouldn’t take you more than 25 minutes to be served. The staff are the same every day, and in my eBay Months I built up quite a bit of banter with Young Post Office Man and Grumpy Old Post Office Witch. The counter staff know basically everything about post, which means they serve very efficiently (hence the fast queue).
Annoyingly, there seems to be a total signal-​blackhole in the queue, meaning you can’t even text your way out of boredom.
I am absolutely being 100% honest when I say I prefer this post office to the one in the city centre. It’s a good honest postie’s, with ugly greetings cards, bad radio, and grumpy staff. Just like the good old days!