THOMASVILLE — If you’re a south Georgian seeking a job with the U.S. Postal Service, you must take an examination next week.

The U.S. Postal Service is seeking job applicants to fill city carrier, mail processing clerk, mail handler and sales/service distribution associate positions.

The positions pay between $16.65 and $17.69 an hour.

Job seekers must first take the post office’s new 473 Battery Exam and achieve a score of at least 70 or higher.

The exam takes about an hour-and-a-half to two hours to complete.

To help candidates prepare, USPS is offering pre-exam workshops in Augusta, Albany, Columbus, Macon, Savannah and Valdosta next week.

The workshops will cover five different sections of material that will appear on the test such as address checking, forms completion, coding, memory and personal characteristics.

The workshops are free and attendance is not required in order to take the exam.

Nancy Clark, a USPS customer relations coordinator, said in previous testing years, anywhere from 300 to 600 people have been tested at a session for USPS jobs.

She said there is no concrete way to determine exactly how many jobs are available at any one time.

Clark said people who take and pass the exam will have their applications entered into a national database from which the USPS offers qualified candidates jobs as they become available.

Clark said applicants may not hear immediately from USPS whether they will be offered a job. The screening process takes a long time and applicants might not hear from USPS for years whether they will have a position.

“When you pass the test, you would be on the register for two years,” Clark said.

She said USPS maintains information about how applicants can extend their applications as far as three years.

For more information about USPS employment, call USPS with a touch tone phone at 1-866-999-8777 (hearing impaired TTY: 1-800-601-8953) or check the Internet at www.usps.gov/employment.