This is a friendly local post office. It's some years since they ditched the grocery store for a subway eatery (take out only) and the once two counters increased at the same time to three.
The post office is run by an Asian family and they are friendly and polite always to me, but maybe because I have been using it for years, I always get a smile.
As the popularity of Hulme and redevelopment of houses in the area has increased it has become a very busy post office serving the needs of the local community and local businesses and so peak times can be exceptionally busy, and if you use it between the hours of 4.30 and 5.30 weekdays you will no doubt get stuck behind a local business person checking in 20 or so parcels - which can be frustrating particularly if there are only 2 people on the counter (which often there are). You can easily be 30 mins stuck in the queue. If you are unlucky you may well get stuck behind several local entrepreneurs weighing in their sales for the day and you can be there longer.
It really is not big enough for today's modern and growing Hulme community now there is a campus opposite and hundreds (if not thousands) of student flats.
For that reason I am giving it 4 stars. My advice is to avoid peak times and use it between 10.30 and 12noon and 2 to 4pm to get the best quick service, with a smile.
Note, on the plus side, though the normal business hours of local post offices on SAT's are till 12.30, this post office stays open till 5 though there will be no collections after 12.30 (12.15?) but at least your mail will be ready for collection Monday morning if the only time you can get to the post office is when it's closed in the week.
Sub Note: I always find it frustrating in this country that banks and post office are open only till 5/5.30 and if you are at work all day, you're knackered. To say we have been in Europe for 45 years, in all this time we have never adopted European open times. Banks and post offices should be open till 7pm to allow people to use them when they finish work and so would release the pressure on queues in the lead up to closing time. read more