Highland Council puts on hold service points closures
Highland Council has put its plans to shut 23 service points on hold for at least the next 15 months.
The sites allow the public to get face-to-face advice on council services from staff.
The local authority has proposed closing 23 of its 35 offices, including in remote locations such as Durness, Acharacle and Gairloch.
At a meeting in Inverness, councillors voted 43-31 in favour of a review of usage of the sites.
Highland Council said the 15-month delay would also allow time for £68,500 of improvements to be done to its website.
Critics of the cuts said older people who have no computer access would be badly affected by the loss of their nearest service point.
The local authority said there has been a fall in demand at service points.
It also said that almost a third of customers wanted to be able to access services online.