An Post has announced that it is to create over 200 jobs in Athlone and Portlaoise.
The expansion is part of An Post's ongoing €97 million national programme of mail automation.
At least 135 new staff will be recruited to work at An Post's €18 million plant in the Dublin Road Business Park in Athlone. It will service mail from the west and north-west.
Around 65 further staff will be taken on at the Portlaoise mail centre, which currently employs almost 100 staff. The centre handles 200,000 items a day, a workload which is scheduled to double over the coming months. It mainly services the Dublin and Leinster areas.
The job vacancies, which will be advertised this week in local papers, will be filled by November, a spokesman for An Post said.
Another huge mail centre being built at Little Island, Co Cork. It is hoped this will be finished by the middle of next year, and will employ over 100 people.
The Cork plant will be the final piece in An Post's plan to introduce a fully-automated national overnight next day delivery system, the company said.
