Don't they trust us to pay excess postage?

LETTER - A recent letter told of the writer having to journey to the post office to pay £1.02 because his mail had 2p short of its postage.

This is far from funny and has happened to me for the second time today (the first time a lady with poor eyesight had simply put a wrong stamp on her card of good wishes).

My understanding today - when I struggled home from the bus stop with heavy carrier and stick to find the card from the post office, was that it was too large to go through the letter box - not even the truth as it slid through more easily than limp envelopes.

I had taken the next bus straight back to the town. One may be elderly and very lame but "they" do not care two pence, and after many decades here one isn't trusted to pay their 2p next time the postman calls.

The staff at the GPO have always been great, kind and helpful without fail, but I shall never again vote for a government which allows such strange rules and regulations at sorting offices - indeed one which allows a national public service to be thus privatised.

And to employ people not allowed to be human. But, then, our village headteacher is not here to tell us we should know when to wisely break a rule.

I should have stopped voting because of Iraq but had always believed a party's ideals to matter more than governments mistakes, up to now.

Mary Stringer, Bridgnorth