Poste HasteI’ll be announcing the results of last month’s ‘Small Print’ competition in the next issue, but the biggest talking point about the task on Chatterbox was the “all entries must arrive ON June 30th” aspect. Apologies if you missed that bit, and are now slapping your forehead in horror (snigger).
Admittedly the Royal Mail is not as efficient as it once was, and it is clear that we’ll never return to the good old days when you could send a postcard from the office mid afternoon to warn your other half that you’d be late home for tea that evening. Still, that’s progress I suppose. For my own comp I’ll be using leniency and common sense to judge this particular aspect, and as long as you made a reasonable effort to hit the June 30th target you’ll be safe. But this seems a good time to flag up some hints and tips on getting the best out of the Post Office – especially when you have a last minute entry that really MUST arrive at its destination the next day.
The first piece of advice though, in this day and age, must be to NEVER leave an entry until the last minute. The Post Office these days simply can’t be trusted to deliver on time (or even at all, some might argue), and even if they do pull out all the stops and get your letter to its destination on time we can never know how many people and departments there are to be negotiated at the other end. It’s no use if, while a judging panel is mulling over entries in a penthouse boardroom somewhere, your own precious attempt is still being processed in the basement. So always try to give yourself plenty of time.
If this isn’t possible, then you must pull out all the stops to ensure that your entry speeds through the postal system as quickly as it can. Here are a few basic do’s and don’ts.
DO use a standard sized envelope whenever speed is of the essence. This will make it more likely that your entry can be machine sorted, which will hurry it through the system. You don’t seem to see the old ‘Post Office Preferred’ logo nowadays that used to appear on stationery, but my advice is to always use C6 (i.e. half A5 size), C5 (half A4), or DL (LWE sized long envelopes) when you’re in a hurry. And stick with standard postcards. Machines can cope with these, so keep your homemade efforts and strange shapes and sizes for something less urgent.
DON’T use brightly coloured envelopes, or ink. These can sometimes ‘blind’ the machine, and you’ll lose precious time if your item needs to be sorted by hand.
DO use a ‘proper’ first class stamp. These are encoded with a wide band (tilt a stamp to the light and you’ll see it – it’s much thinner on second class stamps, and doesn’t appear at all on most other values), which the machine reads and automatically sorts as first class. Adding odd stamps to a second class stamp to make up the value, or even using two second class stamps, will not replicate that first class ‘band’, so don’t take the risk.
DO, if possible, type the address on an urgent letter. Again, this will improve the chances of the machine being able to automatically read and sort it. If you can’t do this, write neatly and put at least the Post Town in block capitals. Always ensure that the postcode is written separately, and that it makes up the very last line of the address.
DO always follow the Post Office’s own advice on addressing your letters. Don’t use commas, full stops or any other punctuation (it can fool the machine), and do not centre or stagger your lines. Provided a post town and postcode are used, it is no longer necessary to include a county name.
DO try to ensure that there is at least a 2cm space between the last line of an address (i.e. the postcode) and the bottom edge of your envelope. The first thing that the machine looks for is the postcode, so help it to do this by writing it in the correct place, in the correct format, all on its own. On the other side of the coin, to reduce the risk of postcards being delivered straight back to you as a result of your own postcode being ‘found’ first, try to ‘hide’ it by writing other things on the same line or underneath. Or try to adapt the format (e.g. by running all of the characters together) to disguise it. Many seasoned compers also write their own details at a right angle to the stamp and destination address to further lessen any element of doubt.
DON’T underline a postcode. Remember that there should be nothing at all underneath a postcode, and that includes lines. Even this could be enough to throw the machine off the scent, so avoid it on urgent letters. Try to use unlined postcards too when you’re in a hurry, for the same reason.
DO send a postcard by first class mail. It’s an urban myth that postcards “only” go second class, left over I think from a bygone age when there used to be a cheaper postcard rate.
DON’T risk ‘Freepost’ with urgent mail. Although there’s a possibility that pre-printed cards and envelopes (the ones with a narrow barcode running along the top or bottom of the address) could go first class – it all depends on what the company concerned has paid for, and the information in these cases is hidden in the barcode – most will go second class. And ALL Freepost mail with a hand-written address goes second class. Again, ignore the myths that Freepost goes even slower than second class – it certainly shouldn’t do, and my information here is taken from the official Post Office Guide.
DON’T just stick a first class stamp on a Freepost envelope, scribble out the ‘Freepost’ bit, and hope for the best. This can sometimes work, especially on older style Freepost addresses, but most Freepost addresses today, and especially their postcodes, are unique. Some high-volume addresses might even have a postcode designed to direct the mail to a bigger sorting office in a completely different area, that’s better able to cope with the influx. So you could confuse things no-end! It’s worth a try in an absolute emergency, but there’s no guarantee of success. Better I think, if you’re really desperate, to attempt to find out a ‘real’ postal address from the Promoter or the Post Office’s Customer Services and to try that.
DON’T bank on there being a Saturday delivery to a P O Box number. Most of these are only serviced Monday to Friday, perhaps even less if promoters choose to collect mail from a Box number themselves.
DON’T think that by sending something urgent by Recorded Delivery, it’ll go faster. It won’t. In fact, the need for a signature might even slow things down. The service that you need for guaranteed next day delivery (although bear in mind that even this isn’t infallible) is Special Delivery. But again, remember that the need for a signature might actually delay things – especially if your letter is going to an anonymous P O Box number. If in doubt, try to check first.
DO try to post as early in the day as possible, at the busiest pillar-box – one at a Post Office if you can. Although only ‘final’ collection times are now advertised, most busy boxes have collections throughout the day and the quicker your own envelope gets into the system, the better.
Of course, I’m not saying that you should go through this process with every letter that you post. But it will certainly improve your chances of an urgent item getting to its destination on time. To reiterate though, the best way to ensure that you don’t get caught out is to always POST EARLY!
Good luck with your entries.
Smid x
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