Postal Card Misuse

Great items Thomas

OK, theoretical question only ...

I have a few of these older US Postal Cards, Scott UX74. Can these 1978 cards be passed through the mail without additional postage since they are "US Domestic Rate"? (First Forever Card?) I'm guessing NOT!

Love that bisect/cut-out cover Thomas

I don't see why not, I have not heard of them being demonetized and they plainly say "domestic rate" rather than a face value.

Maybe I can push it even further? Cut it out and glue it on an envelope and see if anyone at the post office notices? My guess ... Yes!

"I'm guessing NOT!" (responding to Partime)

Correct. These were akin to the "letter" postage (A, B, C, etc.).
This was the A postal card, only they didn't include the "A".

It sold for $.10.

Edit: eventually I'll get it right.

Lovely covers, Thomas.




Q/ Why must we suspect the worst, when indifference can always be counted on to make a difference?

In the case of the two (presumably) small towns in Washington State, howzabout Ms Rector simply gave the cover to a friend she met at church every Sunday, and asked her to post it when she got home? (Okay, these towns are 238 google miles apart, but you get the point).

One of the Postcards In The News items had to do with a gal mailing herself a postcard from each of 50 places before her 50th birthday. Perhaps Ms Rector mailed herself a trick cover every time she travelled, and destroyed the covers that got caught, and kept the ones that got thru clean?

Put another way, how many times do you think you would have to try this yourself before you succeeded?

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

"how many times do you think you would have to try this yourself before you succeeded?"

While I collect these, I've never tried to make one. I'm guessing the answer to your question is: 1.

Unless the postal service person is a DMM fanatic, what hassled USPSer wants to spend extra effort to track down $.49. Even mgt would tell him to forget it.

This was a VERY popular thing to do, particularly from the late 20's to the early 60's. 99% of them were philatelic in nature and intent. That does not make them less fun, or less collectable to those that do like them, but practically no one would do this just because they ran out of adhesive stamps. They might have done it to try and force the utilities to pay the postage or the postage due, but those others were done by people who likely did a lot more than one.

I don't know about 49 cents, but I do know that my local PO recently tried to collect $1.62 in postage due that I disputed and refused to pay. After two times, and three trips on my part to the PO, they gave up. It all depends on what USPSer it is, and what day of the of the month and phase of the moon it is, I suppose.

"These were akin to the "letter" postage (A, B, C, etc.).
This was the A postal card, only they didn't include the "A".

I would bet that no one currently in the PO would know or care or even recognize it as the postal card version of the A stamp. With all the forever stamps floating around this would slide right past. Assuming anyone uses them any more to any degree (all the ones I get are for philatelic purposes, shows and meeting notices).

OK, I've got about 10 of these. If anyone wants one, please email me your address and we'll give it a go. (Please note that you would be responsible for all postage due and any jail time.)

A few other comments:

In the case of the Ms. Rector covers, remember that they contained no return address so the post office had no choice but to deliver them to the addressee. Sure, they could have assessed postage due on them at the time of delivery, but the few cents was probably more paperwork to process than it was worth asking for.

Fast forward to the ideas as to whether or not it would work today and my opinion is that some still go through, but with the sophisticated postal equipment in use today to check for tagging on stamps or postal stationery, it is reasonable to think that some creative covers such as this would get spit out of their machinery because of postage that is believed "invalid" to their equipment. It would then be up to a postal clerk to manually determine if fraud was the intent or if an honest mistake was made as to the type of postage affixed.

Once again, in most cases it's not worth pursuing for the small change involved; but if a trend develops you could find yourself in trouble for defrauding the USPS. Remember that recent reports have found that most mail is scanned for postage and addresses, and I can imagine it would take little effort to keep a file on these things if one were to try and defraud the USPS multiple times.

Do keep in mind that some of the sample covers posted are dated back to the time when postage was 3 or 4 cents and automated postal machinery didn't exist like it does today. With postage rates what they are presently, it may make it more desirable to attempt to get the postage due than it was decades ago.

I particularly remember the retail prices of the very early 1970s; gas was <1/10th of what it cost today, stamps were close to 1/10th of what they cost today, Campbell's soup, NYC subway tokens, ground beef ...

Therefor, I think that the economic risk of letting one letter pass - and the economic benefit of recovering the MIA postage - is just about the same as it always was. Yes, the technology makes it easier to catch errant pieces. OTOH, the technology to count every piece of mail that every employee handles encourages a blind (human) eye to time-consuming defects.

All in all, I suspect, a wash.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

The classic story about using cut outs of postal stationery: A secretary from the secretarial pool (or temp agency, I forget) screwed up the addresses on several envelopes. To hide her mistake, she correctly typed the addresses onto plain envelopes then carefully cut out the stamp images and carefully attached them to the new envelopes. This was so well done that not only was the postal service fooled but so were stamped collectors! Eventually someone observed the envelopes at an angle and realized that cut outs had been artfully applied to different envelopes.