Royal Mail will be operating extended opening hours in more than 1,200 delivery offices across the UK this month to offer festive shoppers more convenience when picking up parcels.

The company has also revealed the recommended posting dates for Christmas 2016 is December 20, for Second Class mail, and December 21 for First Class Mail.

Special delivery items must be posted by Thursday, December 22 - or the following day for Special Delivery Saturday Guaranteed post.

Royal Mail has already recruited 19,000 seasonal workers and opened nine temporary parcel sort centres to deal with the festive mailbag.

Royal Mail’s 1,400 delivery offices currently open six days a week. Almost half already open later on Wednesday evenings for customers to collect items.

More than 200 delivery office customer service points are already open on Sundays for collection of mail.

Alexandria Delivery Office, Lomond Industrial Estate, is open until 8pm on Wednesdays. It it open between 7am and 1pm, and then 3-6.30pm on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, and between 7am and 2pm on Saturdays.

There will be no collections or deliveries on Monday, December 26 or on Tuesday, December 27, in lieu of Christmas Day

Sue Whalley, Royal Mail’s chief operations officer, said: “Opening many of our busiest delivery offices later helps our customers at this very busy time of the year.”

Some of Royal Mail’s delivery offices are opening until 5pm on Christmas Eve.

Opening hour information is available at delivery offices, on the something for you cards left by the postman or online at www.royalmail.com. Customers requiring more support can call customer services on 03457 740 740.

UK latest recommended posting dates for Christmas 2016 are:

Tuesday, December 20 for Second Class mail

Wednesday, December 21 for First Class mail

Thursday, December 22 for Special Delivery

Friday, December 23 Special Delivery Saturday Guaranteed

International cards and parcels latest recommended posting dates for Christmas delivery are:

Saturday, December 3 - Africa, Middle East

Wednesday, December 7 - Cyprus, Asia, Far East (including Japan) and Eastern Europe (except Poland, Czech Republic and Slovakia), Turkey, Malta

Thursday, December 8 - Caribbean, Central and South America

Saturday, December 10 - Greece, Australia and New Zealand

Wednesday, December 14 - Czech Republic, Germany, Italy and Poland

Thursday, December 15 - USA, Canada, Finland and Sweden

Friday, December 16 - Austria, Denmark, Iceland, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain and Switzerland

Saturday, December 17 - Belgium, France, Republic of Ireland and Luxembourg