Ireland Soar (Stamps On A Roll) IInformation

See below a few of my SOAR stamps from Ireland. These aren't covered in Scott or on Stampworld but I understand the Hibernian catalogue does so and possibly also the Revealer. Unfortunately I don't as yet have access to these resources. I found a small website called SOARVIEW with some pictures but not much information about the individual stamps

https://irishsoarview.wixsite.com/s...r-7--8-c12g9

Is anyone aware of other online sites dealing with Irish SOARS? Any idea the approx. values for the 4 SOARS posted below? I understand the top number indicates Year and date and the larger number below the transaction number and sale location with the small number in the bottom right corner being the stamp number out of a roll of 600. Any other insights welcome.

Maybe this website will help you :
http://www.ateeme.net/anglesw/aie_13soar.htm

I love SOAR.
Gibbons catalogue them but earlier this year describe them as Machine Labels.
They are sold at Post Office counters and are in rolls of 600 but on occasions there have been more.
There are usually 8 designs in a series....and arranged so that stamp#1 is also stamp #9 and #17 thru the roll.
They change each year.
The first few series were Mammals/Birds/Fish.
In 2016, there were 16 in a roll, appropriately for the Centenary of the Easter Rising.
They contain quite a lot of information.
The first stamp in your pic is the Easter Rising and issued on the 310th day of 2016
The first four digits in the 14 digit number idicates it was issued in Cloyne, County Cork at counter number 1 and it is #244 on the roll.
The other stamps were issued in Roscarbery, County Cork, Kilnamanagh Shopping Centre in Dublin and at High Street in Waterford.
I have a list of these numbers ....1425 initially but due to post office closures there are now less than 1,000.
I have several thousand SOAR, mostly unsorted in kiloware.
I am still looking for 123 post offices (71 are still open, 43 recently closed and the rest are "new" post offices which have opened but I dont know the 4digit number)
I dedicate a page to each post office and leave room for a photograph. Thanx to public transport (bus, tram, train) being free for senior citizens, I can travel to any town or village. I have around 200 photographs.
Generally I arrange a 6x4 pic and have room for 9 SOAR on a page. But some post offices are small and I maybe only have one SOAR while other times I have 50 plus SOAr from a large post office. I like the diversity.
ie
early SOAR....birds/mammals/fish
2016 ...Easter Rising
2017-present....the series is "History of Ieland in 100 Objects" so it has a few years to run. Unfortunately the continuity of this series is broken up by adding "popular" commemoratives into the mix.
The diversity is enhanced by the value shown on the stamp. It can be as little as 1 cent but the highest I have found is Euros 55.
Of course the most common one is the national rate postage, currently Euro 1.
As the stamps are all self adhesive, I leave them on paper and in itself this adds "colour"...most envelopes are white or brown but sometimes (Valentines, Christams) the stamps are on red, and other times, green, yellow whatever.

To me, it has added depth and texture to my Ireland collection.
I dont know if there is a specific website but I mention New Issues on my Blog.

Hello.
I really liked this series and decided to complete it.
I would have liked each SOAR to have its stamp replica.
Regards.

Lovely pages, Roberto. Well done.

I'm so impressed with the very helpful and interesting responses so far on this thread about SOAR stamps of Ireland. I posted my question before going to bed and these answers were waiting in the morning (central Canada). By the way it's below freezing here today so a good day for stamps!

Vayolene the website specializing on machine printed stamps is very helpful. It had a detailed report on Irish SOAR's and related stamps. To read the full repot you must become a paid member so I will consider doing that. I'm not yet a dedicated SOAR collector like Roberto and FitzjamesHorse but it's tempting!

The pages Roberto posted are very impressive. It would indeed be nice to have a standard stamp to go along with or duplicate each SOAR but I assume postoffice profit dictates otherwise. The lower right Christmas stamp in my posting has a similar three kings SOAR stamp in the series and I saw a similarly styled Standard Christmas stamp for 2016 in Scott.

Thank you FitzjamesHorse, I'll find a Gibbons catalogue to help organize my (so far) small collection of SOARs. A listing of all the machine location codes would be helpful - does the Postoffice of Ireland provide this information? How might I connect to your blog posts? I understand why you leave your SOARs on paper but it looks like Roberto has soaked his off and mounted them nicely on his own album sheets. Once off paper do these stamps tend to stay gummy and curl up? It is handy to have free public transport around Ireland for seniors! I assume this is for Irish citizens or even for EU member countries, but not North American tourists?!

Again thanks everyone so far. Will check back for any further feedback.

Rick

Wigeon....there is a link to my Blog in y profile. If you type "SOAR" or "New Issues" in the Search box you will find the posts on SOAR.
The Irish Post Office have a "Find your nearest post office" online app and years ago they included the four digit number but now they dont do it. There are some post offices which opened after the first list was published so I dont know the 4digit number. I guess I will just have to go to all the new post offices and buy a stamp (I have already visited the new Dublin offices...usually the new offices are inside newly built shopping malls).
Strangely An Post now regard the 4digit numbers as "commercially sensitiv"
As Roberto59 knows, the non-SOAR stamps are either Coils (the bigger stamps) or from Booklets (the smaller stamps). Usually 8 SOAR are issued every year, and two designs used for Coils and two designs used for Booklets.
The Post Office refer to them as Definitive stamps. Probably at most one third of post offices stock regular commemorative stamps. SOAR is easier for the post office staff.
A lot of info is picked up in conversation with collectors or post office staff.
For example there are SOAR stamps not issued in post offices. They are issued in a system called EasyPost, a facilty for large firms who use the mail a lot. I didnt really know about this (but had guessed) until about two weeks ago and blogged about it.
Also chatting to staff in a post office in the Irish midlands, I was told that a blackmaler was identified and imprisoned because of information contained on a SOAR stamp. The info includes a coded timestamp so An Garda (police) were able to identify the post office where the stamp was bought and date and time. And CCTV recorded it all.

Thank you FitzjamesHorse for the blog info and update on the post office codes. Not as much use of these machine stamps yet in Canada but some ongoing testing continues with a few formats. Sounds like SOAR information, like credit card use and genealogy databases can be used to scoop up some unsuspecting criminals! Look forward to checking your blogs:)

I have a question about the SOAR stamps that I have never seen addressed anywhere else.

Some of mine have a box around the printed value. Also, some stamps with this box have a code printed where the year and day normally appear.

The example shown here has the code "F045" where the usual date of purchase, 5-digit year and day code such as 12170 (Year 2012, 170th day) would normally be.

I'm hoping FitzjamesHorse can answer. Thanks in advance.

Bookbndrbob- I just read one of John's blogs about this. I believe the square around the denomination indicates that a company doing a lot of mailing has a machine and are printing off their own postage. Hopefully he will advise further. Rick

I only discovered this thru an Exhibition at the Stampa National Exhibition just over two weeks ago.
I have always assumed that these were something to do with mail being sent out by companies who use the mail quite a lot.
And this was indeed confirmed. This is an "EasyPost" machine which are issued to major users.

https://www.anpost.com/Commerce/Bul...tamp-Printer

As an aside, I would reckon that about 40% of all Irish kiloware are SOAR, 40% booklet or coil stamps, 15% commemoratives and about 5% are EasyPost.
Not particularly a scientific survey. As the kiloware I get is collected in Ireland, its possible that a lot of easypost mail goes abroad.

Thanks guys! This had me wondering for quite some time.

One more question, please. My SOAR kiloware contains very few stamps sold from the postal kiosks in malls, airports, etc. Is this generally true / to be expected?

Hard to say...the kiosk SOAR seem to have numbers that begin..."98..." and they occasionally show up in kiloware but rarely and on stamps issued few years ago.
Some of the locations listed such as Stephens Green Shopping Mall and Jervis Shopping Mall dont seem to hvae kiosks although I have never asked at Customer Services.
I have been to Dublin Airport several times but never seen the one supposedly installed (there is no post office at the airport).
Likewise there is supposed to be one at the General Post Office but I've never seen it and I am there for New Issues.
The Philatelic Counter only sells SOAr in strips of 8 or 16 (2016) or just 2 (Christmas) and are never numbered beyond 2, 8 or 16. So they appear to have their own printer "upstairs".
The 4digit number is 0250....and yet there is a lot of kiloware showing 0250 (with high numbers) so presumably they are from the kiosk that I have never seen.

I hace several SOAr with 4digit numbers that are not on the original list of 1,425. I have always assumed these to be "new" post offices which have opened in recent years and by working on a second list showing locations and visiting some and buying a stamp, I can sometimes match these up.
But there is a sequence beginning 68....eg 6801. 6802. 6803 and so on that dont seem to be actual post offices and might be kiosks.
But where are they?????

Thanks FitzjamesHorse. Very interesting. Hopefully the information will be revealed at some point in the near future.

Here are 3 from different clippings. All have the same kiosk/machine code.



Bravo on finding the 55 euro label. My highest value so far is only 16 euros.

9803001 is I believe Blanchardstown Shopping Centre (Mall) about 7 miles from Dublin City Centre.

Thanks again FitzjamesHorse!

I enjoy finding the stamps with the extra services line. StandardPost, RegisteredPost, and ExpressPost seem to be fairly common. I have found only one with 'ExpressPost w/Sig'.