Energy threat from leaflet delivery scum

George_Bray

Few of us ask for various leaflet and free newspapers to be put through our letterboxes. It's bad enough to have this junk dumped on your doormat but, unlike the Royal Mail postmen, they often leave the leaflets and newspapers sticking half out of the letterbox, with at least two bad effects:
(a) it opens a great hole in one's heat insulation, letting in loads of cold air, and
(b) it's an open advert to potential burglars that there may be nobody at home.

Any suggestions for how to deal with this threat? I considered blocking my letterbox after the postman has been each day, but then I might forget to unblock it before the postman calls again.

External containers (for all deliveries) seem a bit insecure. Any better ideas?

Regards
George

Iguana

You can ring up the head office of the free newspapers and ask them to stop delivering to you.

Queenie

I have a sign up by my letterbox (home made - simply printed it off the computer) to discourage any leaflets/newspaper/cold callers/etc) It works 99% of the time - now, if I could just get the kebab shop in the other town from posting their menu's through ... I could boast 100%

Ken68

I put a paperback in the letter box ,which is removed in the morning, pre postman, then replaced. It just fits the letter box and has on it "PUSH", in large print.Otherwise it stays there all the time.It also stops the letter flap flapping if you know what I mean.

cougar_3

You could get one of those draft excluders with bristles. Difficult to describe, but it would block everything around the paper.

cattie

It's a little unfair to describe the leaftlet & newspaper delivery people as scum. They are only ordinary people doing the job for a little extra cash.

However, I agree it is very annoying when they don't push the papers & leaftlets right through your letterbox. I'm doing a sign to fix by my door stating that leaflets should not be left unless pushed fully through letterbox.

George_Bray

cattie wrote:

It's a little unfair to describe the leaftlet & newspaper delivery people as scum. They are only ordinary people doing the job for a little extra cash. However, I agree it is very annoying when they don't push the papers & leaftlets right through your letterbox. I'm doing a sign to fix by my door stating that leaflets should not be left unless pushed fully through letterbox.

I concede that I used the word 'scum' partly because I'm so angry with these mindless delivery people and partly to make a good headline.

Your wording suggestion for a sign is a good one. I may try that. I could do without all the leaflets, actually, but am pleased to receive the free newspapers, if only they'd push them through. My letterbox is not restricted in any way and it's sheer laziness that they don't push the free newspapers all the way through. The energy leakage and potential burglary threat is serious. Leaflets left half stuck out look untidy. What right have they got to make my front door look a mess? Are these delivery people really so thick? Do they not receive even a few minutes of basic training? I don't care about their need for extra cash when they are a threat to my property. When I go away on holiday, there might be no Royal Mail deliveries for a few days, by chance, in which case a newspaper left stuck half out of the letterbox for several days would help advertise the fact that there's nobody at home.

Regards
George

redux

you forgot to mention that the ones you'd like to read might get wet

Queenie

George, you raise a very valid point re: potential burglary; I can completely empathise with your strength of feeling too!

I don't believe that delivery personnel of free papers/leaflets do receive even the most basic of training - because most of the time, no "qualifications" are required and equally, it's a high turnover of staff.

Yes, one would hope that common sense would prevail - sadly, not every one is endowed in that department

As I said in my post above, I have a sign (printed off my computer) making it quite plain regarding what I accept at/through my door/letterbox. The classic had to be a lady who worked for a well known cosmetic company who only sell door-to-door. She left her brochure (yes, half in half out) with a note explaining that she would be returning in a couple of days for the brochure (I believe that pay for them themselves?) and any order.

Couple of days pass. She leaves another note very similar to the first one.

Couple of days pass. Ditto above.

Eventually, she caught me on my way out of the house ... asking a) for any order and b) the return of her brochure.

I explained that a) I have no order; b) the brochure no longer exists (being placed in the bin as "unsolicited mail"; c) why on earth would I do 'business' with someone who couldn't even "read" and pointed to the note.

Very apologetic she was and we parted on relatively amicable terms.

Fast forward two months ... yes, you've guessed it; she delivered the *latest* brochure and order form! :wall: Suffice to say, she didn't make the same mistake a 3rd time!!!

The letter box draught excluders referred to by cougar, won't fit my letter box - it isn't a standard size and they all seem to come in the one-size-fits-all variety that you can trim *down* but you can't add to! :rolleyes:

Ah, the joys of our modern society

black-saturn

Couldnt you print up a notice saying "please push leaflets right through" then if they still dont you could then ring the paper company about it.

You never know when some wonderful opportunity might arise through it.

Hermia

cattie wrote:

It's a little unfair to describe the leaftlet & newspaper delivery people as scum. They are only ordinary people doing the job for a little extra cash.

However, I agree it is very annoying when they don't push the papers & leaftlets right through your letterbox. I'm doing a sign to fix by my door stating that leaflets should not be left unless pushed fully through letterbox.

I used to be a papergirl in my youth (!) and would always push stuff through, but sometimes wouldn't if people had those horrible springy letterboxes. The amount of time I scraped the skin off the back of my fingers - grrrr! Houses with dogs also used to worry me so I often didn't push the stuff through properly then (the amount of people who don't control their dogs is staggering).

The reason newspaper/leaflet delivery people don't do things properly is that the bosses are so vile. I delivered free papers and only did it because it was recession-time when I was a teen and it was impossible to find any other job where I lived. The papers and leaflets were delivered on Wednesday lunchtime and I had to deliver them that day. It was a long round and would take a few hours. If the papers were bulky or I had extra leaflets it would take longer because I couldn't take them all round in one go. A lot of peoples' houses are very hard to get into: what with security gates and evil dogs running around. If we didn't deliver a paper to a house and the boss found out we were in serious trouble (the newspaper carried out random checks). There was one house where the solid gate was barred and it was impossible to get in and the newspaper rang him to ask if the paper was delivery and he said 'no', but didn't mention the fact that the house was a fortress and he didn't answer the bell! Another twit had no letterbox or mailbox. There was absolutely nowhere I could leave the paper if it was raining so I just left it on the doorstep. He would then complain about the wet paper - grrrrr! Basically by the time I'd dealt with the idiots I was in such a rush that I probably didn't make sure papers were pushed right through...