Post Office - Definition - Law Dictionary Home Dictionary Definition post-office

Definition :

Post office, the expression 'post office' includes every house, building, room, carriage or place used for the purposes of the Post Office, and every letter-box provided by the Post Office for the reception of postal articles. [(Indian) Post Office Act, 1898 (6 of 1898), s. 2(h)]

The Government service of the carriage of letters, first established in 1643. Regulated by statutes 7 Wm. 4 & 1 Vict. c. 33; 1 & 2 Vict. cc. 97, 98; 3 & 4 Vict. c. 96 (the Post Office (Duties) Act, 1840, which established penny postage), and many other Acts, which are consolidated by the Post Office Act, 1908, as amended by subsequent Acts. Besides its monopoly in respect of letters, telegraphs and wireless telegraphy (q.v.) and telephones (q.v.), it carries on the business of a carrier of parcels, a savings bank, life assurance, the transmission of money by postal orders and money orders, and pays old age pensions. See also (English) Post Office and Telegraph Act, 1920; (English) Post Office (Parcels) Act, 1922; (English) Post Office and Telegraph (Money) Acts, 1928 and 1931; and also, in connection with (English) National Health and Unemployment Insurance (stamps), old age, widows' and orphans' pensions and other functions.