A HITCH over posting arrangements mean elderly residents and disabled people will not get their new bus passes until about a week into the new national concessionary fare scheme.

The scheme starts on Tuesday, but due to technical difficulties, the contractor engaged to issue passes for Essex has failed to post the 11,000 allocated to Epping Forest residents.

The passes are now due to be posted on Wednesday (April 2) with tesidents expected to receive their new passes by April 7.

The old bus passes, which expire on March 31, will now be accepted - only in Essex - until the end of April.

In changes to the scheme, the new pass allows concessionary travel nationally and concessionary travel will begin from 9:30am instead of 9am.

Epping Forest District Council's director of finance Bob Palmer said: "I'm very sorry for the delay. We are obviously very unhappy and talking to the contractor about how this happened and why we were not notified until March 27."

He added: "As part of the countywide arrangements we ensured we provided the contractor with all the information they needed in good time. This is a new scheme with new arrangements.

"Clearly, there are some lessons to be learned. However I hope that with the situation rectified within a week of the introduction of the new scheme, the inconvenience to residents will be kept to a minimum."