George Orwell famously said: "To see in front of one's own nose needs a constant struggle." And so it is with post offices.
Close to 93% of people live within a mile of their nearest branch, and for every £1 spent in the UK, 14p is channelled through post offices. Indeed, it is estimated that a third of residents and a half of small and medium sized enterprises visit one at least once a week.
However, we have only scratched the surface when it comes to realising their potential. The RSA's new report, Making the Connection, argues that branches could do more to support local residents and businesses while, at the same time, making money. Not only are post offices present in nearly every community; they are also widely trusted and have a continuity and resilience that few other organisations do.
Moreover, trends towards the local – where people live, work and consume in tightly bound areas – may be renewing the relevance of these spaces in people's lives.
It is already possible to see this in the growth of an ageing population and the need for neighbourhood care as well as the introduction of a localist approach to the delivery of services. All of these changes are creating the need for a place where communities can come together and support the renewal of their local area.
Post offices could help local authorities respond to some of the biggest challenges they face:
Localism and empowerment
We may no longer hear the term Big Society, but the government has taken several steps to give local people more power – for example, through neighbourhood planning and participatory budgeting (where people help decide how local money is spent).
Post offices can play a part in raising awareness of such schemes. For example, one subpostmaster (the official in charge of a post office) attends council consultations to air the views of her customers, while another passes on resident opinions to the local MP.
Small business support
The number of microbusinesses in the UK has grown substantially, up 500,000 since the recession in 2008.
Post offices are ideally placed to help these fledgling entrepreneurs navigate the mass of support available to them, including finance initiatives such as startup loans. Post offices could also provide support by giving packaging services to home-based businesses that sell on eBay and Etsy, or helping the self-employed complete tax returns.
Health and social care
It is estimated that subpostmasters in disadvantaged areas look out for between 20 and 50 vulnerable people at a time. Yet post offices could arguably do more to improve the health and wellbeing of residents. One subpostmaster we met takes messages from GPs and hands these over to patients – for example, to remind them to have flu injections. Post offices could play a more significant role in supporting health services – for example, by helping people in receipt of social care to manage their budgets.
Universal credit and welfare changes
A recent survey by the National Federation of Subpostmasters found that 95% of them provide invaluable extras to residents, including giving informal advice and helping them to interpret letters and fill in forms. Such support is likely to be vital in the years to come as the welfare system is overhauled. Subpostmasters could help people make the transition to universal credit, which will mean making claims online and shifting from weekly to monthly payments.
Transforming post offices into community enterprise hubs is no easy task. It will require those in charge of post offices to embrace a more entrepreneurial mindset and the Post Office Ltd to adopt a more enabling style of leadership.
The community enterprise fund has already been launched to support this and customers need to think that their local branch is more than simply a place to pick up groceries and newspapers. It's a make-or-break moment for the post office and the potential prize is too big to ignore.
Benedict Dellot is senior researcher at the RSA.
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