Identity area
Type of entity
Authorized form of name
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
History
The duty of the Receiver General's office was the balancing of cash derived from the income and expenditure of the Post Office. The Receiver General was appointed independently and took responsibility for cash from the hands of the Postmaster General. He took receipt of all money paid into the Department, and paid costs directly from these funds.
Sources of income included payments received from the Postmasters, Inland Office, Foreign Office, Letter Receivers, Letter Carriers and charges levied on incoming foreign letters.
Outgoing payments were mainly for wages, allowances, pensions and normal postal service costs. The balance of cash was transferred to the Exchequer.
The class is comprised, for the most part, of Entry Books of Correspondence which contain authorities for acceptance and payment of monies by probate of wills, letters of administration, powers of attorney, bankruptcy, appointment of assignees, incidental payments, packet boat expenses and warrants for payments of annuities etc.
The position of Receiver General tended to overlap with another prominent financial position, that of Accountant General. The Accountant General was appointed by the Postmaster General to keep an account of all revenue in the Post Office. Due to this overlap the posts were finally merged in 1854, and 1854 is the date of the last entry book in this series.
No other record of the Receiver General's functions exists apart from the material in this class.