Long have I raged against the self-service machines at my local Post Office.  And then what do I find?  I went into the Post Office the other day and the machines are gone.  Where they once stood, now, in the words of Phil Collins, there’s just an empty space.

Victory?

I’m not yet rolling out the bunting, and I’ll tell you for why.

A suspicious part of me is just wondering whether they have been removed only to be replaced by upgraded machines.  I’ll have to wait and see.

But there is another reason why I am not celebrating.  Something else has changed.  The entire Post Office was dead.  I was the only customer.  The solitary member of counter-staff was looking bored, lonely and unappreciated.

In the past, the Post Office would have been buzzing; the hub of the community.  Normally, there would have been a whole queue of customers, among whom I could moan about the self-service machines.

But they were all gone.

Is this the modern Post Office?  A deserted wasteland; a shadow of its former self.  Maybe another reason why the machines have gone is because most of the business of the Post Office has gone online.

That’s the problem with the machines: just when you think you’ve won a battle, you realise that you have lost the war.

© Simon Turner-Tree

Simon Turner-Tree can’t decide whether to celebrate or commiserate.