Australian Specimen Stamps

One of the reasons new issues were sent to the UPU was that members knew what the new stamps looked like.

From the UPU's Letter Post Manual:

Article RL 113
Postage stamps. Notification of issues and exchange between designated operators
1 Each new issue of postage stamps shall be notified by the designated operator concerned to all other designated operators, with the necessary information, through the intermediary of the International Bureau.
2 Designated operators shall exchange, through the intermediary of the International Bureau, one set of each of their new issues of postage stamps and shall send 15 sets to the International Bureau. This represents a total of 235 stamps to be dispatched for each new issue.

Some specimens were for training purposes

Post Office training & Railway Parcels Office training

These are my specimen stamps I found at the back of one of my albums.
Would specimens have been used to post mail?

Eiger:

Not valid for postage.
Exist postmarked on occasions. Some collectors like to push boundaries.

Your "Specimens " are a complete set of 1991 (5 issues) CV 1996 $8

Thank you Rod!

Hi Eiger

I notice you have an Australia joint issue with USSR $1.10 specimen, I also noticed I forgot to add my specimen of that stamp to the collection I have shown at the bottom of page 4.

All those who responded to your post are correct.

To put it into a nutshell, the printing of 'specimen' on a stamp renders them useless for use, though some people have successfully send them through the mail, and many people in the past and some now still have the misconception that specimens are a worthless piece of paper.

Not so, the stamp I use as my avatar cost me nearly $2,000 and is rare, the £1 coronation stamp was issued as a specimen in 1944 for collectors, I view them as a valuable part of a set.

In your post, the ANZAC tradition stamps are a complete set, and in the sports stamps, you are missing the golf specimen.

Rob

Thanks Rob, I will keep an eye out for the golf one to complete the set! I don't think I have any other specimen stamps, certainly no old ones. Your avatar one is lovely!

Bumping this older topic as an additional picture of one item would be a bonus.

On page 2 of this thread, Rob showed us examples of the "Philas House Appeal" Specimens. https://goscf.com/t/57804&whichpage=2#505058 Since I was recently able to obtain an actual Specimen Set still in the original card, I thought I would show it here. (I am going to keep the card, rather than discard it as some dealers tend to do.)

Here are the two stamps, plus a scan of the back showing the special overprint in that area also.


Note that the additional donation fees bring the total value up to $2.50, which was the selling price, at that time.