Private PO Boxes - Any experiences or recommendations?

[imprint]

I don't particularly want my personal information available as with Royal Mail PO Boxes so I've been looking into private PO Boxes based in London and there seems to be lots of companies offering this service. Does anyone have any experiences or recommendations? These ones seemed like the better ones to me but it would be great to hear anyone elses thoughts:

britishmonomarks.co.uk/index.html

interpostbox.com/postboxrental.htm

londonpobox.co.uk/poboxes.html

mbe.co.uk/services_mailbox_rental.aspx

regus.co.uk/virtual/mp.asp?ssid=41084574016102007121059-

Cheers.

 

[Jester00]

I use Prime secretarial services. Never had a problem with them and they are well priced.

 

[Officebird]

For business purposes I always think a mailing address looks a lot better than a PO Box number. I'm not sure how much PO Boxes cost incomparison tough. I know this may sound bias as I offer mail forwarding but I actually only do it for a Darlington address so wouldn't be much use to you.

Maildroppers do London though I think (a member here)

 

[perky]

I have used MBE twice and was very pleased with them both times. They were helpful, efficient, and very much on the ball.

 

[Onehourpa]

I've used MBE a couple of times, I used to use them for my own business address when I originally set up and had no office. Now I recommend them to clients in the same position. They are really good, super helpful and good value I think.

 

[perky]

One more note on Mailboxes Etc -- I used them twice, in the same city but different locations with different owners. The first was absolutely outstanding, A+. The second was also extremely helpful.

 

[imprint]

Thanks for all your replies!

I noticed that Prime and British Monomarks seems to have the same postcodes for their PO Boxes (WC1N 3XX). Is that anything to be concerned about?

MBE do have lots of branches and it's good to hear your thoughts. Do you know if I can call them to check on my mail (saving me a trip)? I don't really expect to get much mail in general.

A business address could be a good option actually and virtually all these companies offer this service as well. It would also be useful if I was to ever incorporate.

Regus seem cheap compared to the rest of them. Has anyone used them?

Cheers.

 

[Julian]

Regus seem cheap compared to the rest of them. Has anyone used them?

Cheers.

Could you be more specific on that? Your comment really, really surprised me because I'm in exactly the same situation as you and I've been looking at the same people and the price I got from the Regus web site was horrendeous, £59 per month just for a mailing address (vs £7.92 a month for British Monomarks for instance).

I've also looked at MBE. I want a good looking street address and one problem with MBE is that they really only offer PO boxes so the street address is just the street address of the local branch with the first line of the address being the PO box number disguised by calling it Suite <x> or Unit <x> instead of PO box <x> where <x> is the number on your PO box. The issue here is that the lower numbered boxes, at least at my branch, are reserved for the most expensive corporate package so you will probably end up with an address like "Unit/Suite 58, 27 the High Street, ..." which to me looks very obviously like a disguised PO box.

I have used londonpobox.co.uk at the Dalton House SW19 address for a previous company although wierdly I know them as www.londonoffice.co.uk. They did the job but I'm looking for something closer to where I live (and where one day I hope to set up a real office) for my new company.

I have a local Regus office which is why I'm really interested in your comment on the Regus price. I'm wondering if one of us read the pricing wrongly, either you saw the monthly price and thought is was an annual price or else I saw the annual price and thought it was monthly. Another possibility is that there is a bug with the Regus web site pricing and I got given the price for a full virtual office service even though I requested the price for just a mailing address.

I'd be most grateful if you could post the price you saw for Regus and how you got it (from the web site? via a direct enquiry?) so that maybe we can clear up this mystery.

- Julian

 

[Eagle]

MBE couldn't be bothered replying to my requests for a quote.

 

[Julian]

MBE couldn't be bothered replying to my requests for a quote.

My MBE is about 150 metres from where I live so I visited in person.

It's probably not fair to put too much weight on Eagle's comment (no offence intended) because I'm pretty sure that MBE is a franchise so the issue will be how competent is the franchisee at the branch that you want to use because the mailbox service will be managed locally.

Eagle's experience is possibly really sad for the franchisees. If his enquiry got lost in the umbrella MBE system and never made it through to the individual franchise holder in his area then MBE is losing their franchisee business. Then again, if MBE did forward it to the right branch and they didn't respond then you (Eagle) probably had a lucky escape.

- Julian

 

[Eagle]

^ I put it down to bad admin/comms. But at the end of the day, they lost my business.

 

[imprint]

Julian, I'm really sorry but it's my mistake. The Regus website is sneaky in the way it lists the price as it looks like 12 months for £59. It then promps you to submit your details for them to get back to you (which I didn't want to do at this stage) so wasn't clear to me at all. I only realised last night that it was a per month price as I was doing another internet search and came across another section of the Regus website that did make it clearer.

My top three are currently:

britishmonomarks.co.uk

And these two new ones I found:

mailboxuk.com

business-inc.co.uk/london-mailing-address.php

These are lowest priced ones which is what my budget dictates. I think I may be leaning towards the business address option (I wasn't particularly aware of this option when I first started searching) rather than a PO Box as it does tend to look more proffesional.

Cheers.

 

[Julian]

Ah. Thanks for the clarification regarding Regus. I thought that was it but had desperately hoped that I was wrong because Regus would have been perfect for me but at £59 a month they're taking the p***.

I also have British Monomarks on my shortlist. Of your other two business-inc.co.uk also looks interesting. Like Monomarks it also gives an address of the form "<Company Name>, <Street Address>" rather than "<Company Name>, Suite <Big-Number>, <Street Address>" the later of which, to me, looks too obviously like a disguised PO box.

One thing I did was a google on the addresses to see what other companies are using the service, partly to see how many customers they have and what sort of companies but also to check, if someone did the same search if I was using the address, that nothing really objectionable comes up. Of the two of your three that I like (Monomarks and Business-inc) the second one looks better on the address test (I think "Universal House" sounds a better address than "Monomark House" and the client list looks slightly better to me).

I'm really hoping I might be able to find something more local to me in Richmond or Twickenham but so far I'm not having much luck and I'm getting closer to the point where I'll need to make a decision but I still have another month or so to keep looking so any suggestions would be gratefully received.

- Julian