Frontline Workers: Maxine and An Post still delivering important services
Post clerk Maxine Scanlon is a glass-half-full kind of girl.
Despite the challenges of Covid-19, she’s grateful she can work through the crisis, keen to deliver vital social welfare payments to regular clients while helping others send cards or birthday greetings to loved ones they can no longer visit.
The pandemic struck as her workplace — the GPO on Cork’s Oliver Plunkett St —was in the middle of a major renovation, reducing their operating space by half while making workers keep safe social distance, but, as Maxine says: “You just have to get on with it.
“I’m a very optimistic person. And I’m well protected at work. I have gloves, a screen, hand sanitiser, a bathroom to wash my hands. We’re privileged at An Post. None of us have been laid off, although our hours have been cut to make more space between staff for social distancing. I feel sorry for people who’ve lost their jobs.”
She said the city’s once-bustling centre has become a ghost town, with very few people on the streets.
“Town is so eerie now,” says Maxine.
We’re pretty much the only place open apart from Dunnes. No one is around when you come out of work at 6.30pm.
“But they’ve lifted parking restrictions so I can just park around the corner now. It’s handy and way safer. And I’m home in five minutes because there’s no traffic.
“Most customers are coming in a long, long time.
“We know them by their first name and always have a little chat. There’s familiarity there which is comforting to people. You usually only get that in smaller post offices but we have that here.
“We’re mostly seeing people for social welfare payments, from Monday to Friday. They’re staggered now to reduce people coming into contact with each other with the coronavirus so people are paid for two weeks instead of one.
“You’d think people would like getting a double payment, but when I came into work at 8.30am there was a queue of people already there, chatting away, and I heard one woman say: ‘Ah this double week pay thing is terrible, I miss the routine of coming every week.’
“People have their routines and they can’t break it, so they still come to the post office.”
Maxine says people cocooning were concerned they couldn’t collect pensions throughout the coronavirus crisis.
However, An Post introduced a system where people could nominate a temporary agent — family, a neighbour or local gardaí — to collect their welfare payments throughout the pandemic.
More than 35,000 temporary agent applications have been approved by An Post so far with thousands more submitted in recent days. Temporary agent forms are available through the post office or AnPost.com
An Post will also now keep welfare payments for 90 days to give people time to arrange a temporary agent or to collect it themselves on a later, safer date.
“No one should feel under pressure to collect their welfare straight away,” says Maxine.
But a lot of older people don’t listen to the advice to stay at home. They’ll come in for the chat anyway. One woman said to me yesterday: ‘I know I’m not supposed to come in but you’re so nice in here, it cheers me up.’
An Post has increased the sealed-off area between staff and customers, and security makes sure safe social distancing is being maintained.
But despite the safety measures, Maxine has noticed that many customers are genuinely scared.
- Shop for essential food and household goods;
- Attend medical appointments, collect medicine or other health products;
- Care for children, older people or other vulnerable people - this excludes social family visits;
- Exercise outdoors - within 2kms of your home and only with members of your own household, keeping 2 metres distance between you and other people
- Travel to work if you provide an essential service - be sure to practice physical distancing
“Some people are very nervous now with the virus,” she says.
“This morning, a girl came in. She’s a regular, she told me that she feels really scared. She had a scarf wrapped up around her face. You can tell that people are scared. That feeling is there.
“When they come up to the counter they might stand a good few feet back. Particularly for people with underlying health issues, or mental health issues it’s very hard.”
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