A BURBAGE woman has labelled the Royal Mail a ‘disgrace’ after finding the special Avebury Stone Circle stamps were not on sale at the village’s post office.

Avebury’s world heritage site was chosen to be part of an eight-strong special stamp collection depicting historic British sites and artefacts from British prehistory.

But when Diane Turner, of Stibb Green, made a trip to Avebury post office last Friday, having read about the special stamp in The Gazette and writing several cards to post with it, she was shocked to find that the Avebury post office did not have any of the stamps at all.

“I think it is an absolute disgrace. What an insult to not allow Avebury post office to stock the stamp, when they are featured on it,” said Mrs Turner.

“Also, what a lack of foresight, as many tourists visit the stones and would revel in being able to send home a stamp of the ancient site that they had visited.

“Royal Mail said to get the Avebury stone circle handstamp, customers should post at the postbox on the High Street in Avebury but that did not happen, which is very frustrating.

“The poor staff at the Avebury post office had not been told about any of this so they had to deal with a lot of fed up people and none of it was their fault.

“I posted my mail in Avebury, so that at the very least, I could receive the Ancient Britain postmark, however, they managed to smudge it, so it was not very clear.

“I then emailed my friends, to show them what they should have received. It is just a ludicrous situation. This is a really clear example of poor communication and organisation on their part. There were a lot of disappointed people.”

The stamps provide a timeline across thousands of years – from a glimpse of a Mesolithic ritual of 11,000 years ago, to metalworking of the Iron Age from 300 BC.

A Royal Mail spokesman said: “We apologise to any customers who were not able to buy Royal Mail’s recently launched Ancient Britain stamps featuring Avebury stone circle at their local Post Office in Avebury. These stamps will be available from January 25.

“Customers still wishing to obtain the handstamp should bring their mail item to Avebury Post Office. These will be returned to Marlborough for stamping and then forwarded on to the addressee. We will do this for mail items received until Friday evening (January 27th)”.