Post Office managers mount a 24-hour walk out today in a move that threatens to disrupt Christmas mail.

About 720 managers will walk out in the third 24-hour strike on what is thought to be the busiest postal day of the year.

The industrial action, organised by Unison, will affect ten branches in Kent and is the latest in a long-running dispute over pensions.

But the Post Office says it's too early to say what impact the strike will have on the county's services.

Kevin Gilliland, Post Office Network and Sales Director, said: "We want to reassure people that almost all of our network will be open and operating normally.

"Action affects fewer than three hundred of our branches, and many of these will be open to maintain services for customers preparing for Christmas.

"It will also be business as usual in the rest of our network - over 97 per cent of branches will be operating their usual Saturday service.

"Instead of trying to unnecessarily alarm customers during the festive season, we want the unions to join us in talks to discuss our strategy.

"Their members work very hard to give our customers the best possible service in the run up to Christmas, this action can only cause concern to customers."

“We are taking this action because the management refuses to talk in a constructive manner about the pension scheme which is currently in surplus to more than £143 million" - Unite officer for the Post Office Brian Scott

Commenting on Saturday’s planned action, Brian Scott said: “We believe that Saturday is the day when most people will be dispatching their cards and parcels to their relatives and friends abroad.

“We are taking this action because the management refuses to talk in a constructive manner about the pension scheme which is currently in surplus to more than £143 million.

“This is the retirement income of our members which is at stake and we are not going to stand idly by and let them lose thousands of pounds when they retire.

“More generally, it appears that it is only the unions that care about the future viability of the Post Office and the services it provides for communities across the UK.

“The management seems to have abdicated its responsibility and as the government ultimately owns the Post Office we call, once again, for junior business minister Margot James to order an investigation into the Post Office’s future and what we consider is a catalogue of managerial incompetence.”

Unite’s Post Office managers first took 24 hours of strike action on September 15 and again on October 31.