Philatelic Term - Mixed Franking

Is there a proper term for a cover that bears stamps from more than one county? Also, why would this be done? I have some that are postage due but sometimes it's just more than one country for the initial postage. I'll dig up some examples later today.

I have some covers sent from the US to England with postage stamps that were forwarded to France & Germany that also have G b stamps attached. I refer to them as dual usage and forwarded.

I'm unaware of a specific term for this. It was just the way things were done prior to the creation of the UPU; a cover had to have a stamp for each country it passed through. The UPU standardized international mail so that one rate would exist for each route or zone, regardless of the number of countries it passed through. (I'm probably oversimplifying things here).

the term is a "mixed franking"

Mixed franking.

The term "mixed franking" is generally used by postal historians, I believe.

And it can happen these days, too. I know one part-time stamp seller who occasionally puts other countries' stamps on his mailings. As long as the US stamps pay the correct postage amount, it doesn't seem to cause the USPS any consternation.

(So it's technically an "overfranked, mixed franking" cover! )

Yeah, I just got one from him this week! Too bad he couldn't get USPS to cancel the foreign stamps.

I'm surprised no marker monkeys got to them.

In revenues the term is usually duel usage. Popular area.

Mixed franking...

Depends on context. These are 'combination covers'

of Bundi (SG 28) and India



of Jammu & Kashmir (SG 38) and India



and of Orchha (SG 3) and India



All necessary because the Imperial Indian authorities didn't accept the stamps of the Indian States for postage into British India.

There also exist what I would describe as Pseudo Mixed-Frankings, where countries used ordinary postage stamps (without for example marking them with a T) as postage dues.

Here the Yugoslav stamp is added to mark payment of the postage due on the understamped German cover.

Thank you to everyone who responded! I wanted to know this term to use as a key word in my inventory so I can find these covers when I want to. Without it I had to hunt through them the old-fashioned way. It took me some time and I never did find the ones that had postage due stamps from the second country. It will be good to have a searching tool!

I did a quick search of the SCF site and found only five references to "mixed franking" and only one picture at the bottom of page 1 here:
https://goscf.com/t/652&SearchTerms=mixed+frank

I am thinking I should change the title of this thread to "Mixed franking" seeing as it has the definition and some examples.

Meanwhile here are a few of mine I could find.

I can't make out the year on this one but it looks like it may be a political statement.


This one might have been pre-stamped by the addressee and then sent to servicemen. Considering the year, the sender may have been qualified to send free!


This one is philatelic-- a first flight. But it was remailed to the sender so it required postage in both directions.


This is one of my favorites. An Esperanto round-robin-- just because they could!

Quote: I can't make out the year on this one but it looks like it may be a political statement.

The sender will have bought the postcard in Berchtesgaden near the border with Austria and put on the two German stamps forgetting to post it while still in Germany. Having crossed the border into Austria he had to put on the Austrian stamp so that the postcard could be mailed from Austria to Aue/Erzgebirg., Germany.

The postcard was posted on Aug. 5, 19.. while the German definitive stamps affixed on it had been issued on Oct.1, 1926 and replaced by another definitive issue of Sept. 1, 1928. The Austrian definitive stamp had been issued on June 1, 1925 and replaced by another definitive issue of Nov. 4, 1929. From which follows that the postcard could have been posted in 1927, 1928 or 1929.

The message reads:
Lieber Hans!
Aus weiter fahren
bei schönstem Wetter
sendet dir treu-Deutsche
Grüsse Dein Freund
Hermann

In a serendipitous bit of synchronicity, the latest edition of American Philatelist has this article in it:

florian,

I stand corrected. Thank you for the explanation-- it makes perfect sense!