Bay of Plenty locals react to proposed regional banking and postal hubs

Rotorua Grey Power president Miriam Ruberl. Photo / Ben Fraser

New Zealand Post offices will soon cease to exist as the company plans to close the remaining 79 branches around the country.

The Government announced yesterday it was exploring the option of creating "regional hubs" for banking and postal services in provincial areas where those services will soon disappear.

However it is too little too late for many in the provincial areas that have been dealing with the news for quite some time.

Rotorua's Tutanekai St post office closed in July and the building is a standalone Kiwibank service.

Meanwhile in Te Puke a community group has been trying to crowdfund a postal service.

Rotorua Grey Power president Miriam Ruberl said talking about hubs now post offices were disappearing was done with the "stroke of a pen".

"It is not the act of God or some calamity that has produced this. It is the stroke of a pen that has made this decision.

"Which could actually be dealt with by another stroke of a pen and delayed until the alternative is in place."

Ruberl said Grey Power members were disgruntled the choice of accessing traditional postal services had been taken from them.

She said peoples' lives had revolved around the postal services for so long and many didn't understand why it had to change.

Karen Summerhays wants the Government to utilise the Te Puke post shop as a pilot for their regional hubs. Photo / File

"There is no reason to ask the New Zealand public if they want a post office or not because of course they want a post office."

She said the push to go digital was not an option for everyone and she was concerned for those without internet access.

She said forcing people to work in a particular way was a fascist idea.

"One might not argue about how businesses must conduct themselves but why are people being told how to conduct their private lives."

Meanwhile, the Te Puke community has been actively trying to save its post office for several weeks and trying to create their own version of a "regional hub".

The Te Puke Centre Working Group is crowdfunding to buy the postal services.

The working group would run the postal services as a social enterprise returning the profits to a charitable trust which would run an information and visitors centre.

The group's chairwoman, Karen Summerhays, said the group didn't want to go into the relationship with debt so they had asked the community to help. The group has set up a PledgeMe page.

"It is a town buying this post office and it is quite humbling really."

The town has raised more than $35,000 of the $50,000 target.

Summerhays was amazed at the number of paper pledges she had received.

She said that in itself was a sign postal services were a necessary part of the community.

"I think that shows there is still a huge amount of our community that is still not online. And if they are online they are just not confident in that space."

Hearing the news about the "regional hubs", Summerhays took it upon herself to contact Finance Minister Grant Robertson who was responsible for New Zealand Post.

She said the Government should take some of the ideas from the group's proposal and use the Te Puke centre as a pilot programme.

"The social enterprise aspect of our proposal plan is something that the Government hasn't probably really looked at yet.

"It has got some real grounding as to why this would work as a social enterprise and it is mainly because it is so neutral."

Receiving a call from a Tauranga woman who had a business in Rotorua but did all her postal service in Te Puke made Summerhays realise the key space that postal services offered to businesses.

"She does it because it [the post office] is easier to access than going into the malls and trying to find a park and lugging all her postal stuff through the mall.

"It's one of those stories that shows it is not just Te Puke that uses the post office," Summerhayes said.

One Greerton business owner has already felt the implications of not having a post office nearby.

Owner of Access Affordable Elevators Geoff Ellett was astounded postal services were disappearing.

Now the business owner has to travel downtown to deposit cheques which he used to be able to do in his local post office.

Ellett said there was always going to be a need for postal services.

"I just think it is shameful that the public of New Zealand are now being shafted by a government-owned service that is still very critical to many peoples' lives."

He believed the separation of Kiwibank and New Zealand Post had resulted in New Zealand Post feeling it was not profitable to maintain services.

Ellett said he was astounded when he learnt the Greerton postal services would disappear because he knew the queue for the post shop was often out the door.

"If New Zealand Post had retained a simple banking operation and that had remained as a single entity, then there wouldn't have been any problem at all providing the comprehensive service all over the country."