canalpost.uk
specialist postal service for boaters
Over 30,000 live-aboard narrowboats, barges, cruisers and houseboats populate our rivers and canals.
It doesn't matter whether you live on a working 40 foot ex-colliery narrowboat, or have finally retired to your fabulous gin palace; constantly cruising or on a permanent mooring. Once you spend any time at all on the cut you'll learn that life can be a pain without a postal address for your bank, credit card issuer, insurance company, the passport office, HMRC or DWP. Even on-line retailers like Amazon won't deliver to a numbered PO box or a third party location, such as the marina office.
the solution
is a virtual mailbox account from expost . . .
. . .with a real uk street address, five user names on each account, free mail forwarding; or have letters scanned instantly to your own secure online viewer. A simple choice of Private or Business accounts means that, if you need a postal address for your own personal and family correspondence ( including parcels and on-line shopping ) or for commercial use, canalpost is the answer!
A canalpost mailbox account will give you a virtual street address, with up to five different named users, free mail forwarding and scanning to your own secure image viewer. As well as having a fixed postal address for your own private correspondence, you can now trade on-line from your boat, with a genuine returns address for your products!
your names, our addresses
Because many businesses, banks, credit card and insurance companies, couriers and authorities; including HMRC and the DVLA, will not deliver to, or even recognise, an obviously numbered PO box, every canalpost mailbox has a genuine postal address that it inherits from the Mail Centre of your choice.
selecting a regional mail centre
We currently have eight fully active regional Mail Centres around the UK, with four more to be launched next spring. Because all mail is scanned or forwarded, you can hold an account at any regional Centre and your letters or parcels will still reach you, wherever you are in the world!
Click the postal address examples below to visit each Mail Centre's own website
We realise that many people prefer an address that either reflects their place of origin ( even though they may be on the cut and constantly travelling! ), and some business mailbox account holders may want to present a 'local' face. Our national network of regional Mail Centres has been designed to provide just such coverage, further detailed in the descriptions below.
south wales
Our longest established regional Mail Centre is located in the centre of Swansea, perfectly situated to provide a generic South Wales address for customers from Cardiff, Pembrokeshire, Newport, Bridgend, Llanelli or Carmarthen.
midlands
Our Midlands regional Mail Centre is located in Telford, providing virtual accommodation addresses to customers from Stoke in the north, Nottingham and Derby to the east and south across the rest of the West Midlands including Birmingham, Wolverhampton, Dudley and Worcester.
south east
Located in Cambridgeshire, this Centre provides a prestigious accommodation address close to London, for customers across the capital, the home counties, Essex and East Anglia including Northampton, Bedford, Luton and Watford, Colchester and Romford.
south west
With a central Taunton address, our South West regional Mail Centre provides a west country presence for customers wanting a PO Box close to Bristol and Gloucester. Serving Swindon, Bath and Bournemouth, plus Plymouth, Exeter and Torquay in Devon.
northern ireland
Providing a UK address in Northern Ireland, this brand new Mail Centre, serving the entire BT postcode area including Belfast and Londonderry / Derry, is already proving an attractive option to customers from the Republic of Ireland, perhaps as a hedge against Brexit.
scotland
The expost Scottish Mail Centre is located in Dunfermline, north of Edinburgh, and serves customers from Glasgow and Dundee, to Aberdeen and the Highlands & Islands with an address north of the border.
london
Our flagship, and the latest of our regional Mail Centres to launch is in the heart of East London, providing a virtual business or private presence for anyone seeking a prestige address in the Capital!
south
With exclusivity across the Southern Counties, we are inviting enquiries for our Mail Centre South Licence.
. . .read the Licence Prospectus!
north west
Ideally located in Greater Manchester, we are now inviting enquiries for the North West regional Mail Centre Licence, with guaranteed exclusivity across all of Lancashire, Merseyside and Cheshire.
. . .read the Licence Prospectus here!
yorkshire
Are you in Leeds, Bradford or Sheffield? We are now inviting enquiries for our Yorkshire Mail Centre Licence.
. . .read the Licence Prospectus here!
north east
With guaranteed exclusivity all the way from Hull, to Berwick upon Tweed, we are now inviting enquiries for the North East Licence, ideally with an address location in Newcastle upon Tyne.
. . .read the Licence Prospectus now!
business or private. . .
which do I need and how do they differ?
Although both Business and Private mailboxes can receive letters and parcels for up to five named Users, and are the same price, the new data protection legislation ( GDPR ), means that we need to record the status of each mailbox so, if your account is only to be used for your own personal correspondence, select Private.
Select Business if you intend to use your accommodation address for any kind of commerce or trading, or if you want to include a business name as a User. You can still use it for your personal mail of course and, as a bonus, if you take a 12 month Business account you can also use it as the registered office address for one or more Companies, at no extra charge!
important. . . about the account holder
In order to simplify the legally required identity verification process, every mailbox account, whether private or business, must be registered with a named individual as the Account Holder. On agreeing to be bound by our Terms and Conditions, the Account Holder is then responsible for the legal, moral and ethical use of the mailbox and compliance with current legislation.
forwarding
is free, all you pay is the onward postage
You now have a fixed, UK street address for official, financial and personal correspondence, and all of your on-line shopping. Your letters and parcels are being signed for on your behalf and stored securely in our Mail Centre, ready to be forwarded. But the questions still remains, how do we get them to you?
don't worry, we have that covered too!
poste restante...
probably the post office's best kept secret
Did you know that you can have your mail delivered to a Post Office of your choice, for collection in person?
And, best of all, the service is completely free. Discover more about Poste Restante in our forwarding page.
affordable, fixed, pricing
guaranteed for the lifetime of your account!
Already cheaper than a numbered PO box from the royal mail, our straightforward charges are frozen for as long as you hold a continuous account with us. Two years, twelve years or twenty years from now, you will only pay the prices as they are shown in this website on the day you register. We absolutely guarantee never to charge you more to renew your account, handle your mail or scan your letters!
Sadly, we don't control the Treasury, so our price guarantee cannot cover future changes to the VAT rate or its application.
live support
always here when you need us
Our Mail Centres are open 364 days a year to receive, sign-for and secure your letter post or parcels. Most importantly, live support is available by telephone and email from 8am every weekday morning, including Bank Holidays, so you always have access to our help and advice when you need it. . . and a team of people ready to update your account for you when you are without an internet connection.
To see why our customers rate us 5 Star 'excellent', read their reviews on Trustpilot!
canalpost, vanpost, expatpost and expost are all trading styles of Expost Holdings Limited, registered in the UK.