Stop junk mail going to my parents house

Lara

My Mum is nearly 80. She gets around 15/20 letters a day all junk mail. I am sure she opens it all & replies as she has piles of letters by the side of her chair. They are nearly all letters saying she has won this amount, that amount, just needs to reply etc etc etc :mad: . She's disabled and doesn't get out very much so I think she replies to these thinking she really is going to win that amount of money etc. My Dad probably posts them for her but doesn't realise what they are.

Does anyone know how I can stop her getting junk mail please?
Thanks.

Jays

Sign her up to the Mailing Preference Service, and if she is getting cold telephone calls there is also the Telephone Preference Service.

This is included in an article somewhere on this site, and in threads, but if you have no success there is a website to the Services.

I have done this for my 75 year old mother with great success.

Two tips though; once your request is processed your mother with get a leaflet from the Royal Mail asking her which hobbies etc she is interested in - do not return it as all you are doing is putting her back on mailing lists, but at this time at her request.

Also, try to get her to understand NEVER to respond to one of those 'you have won something' letters, once she does her name and address are sent to every other scam artist and she will be inudated (spelling?) with those sorts of letters.

Best wishes
Jay

Lara

Thanks Jay - I appreciate your quick reponse. I have tried talking to her but she always says she never replies to them but we know differently. The other problem is credit card companies have also "hit" her and she now has one of those! How on earth can they give someone her age a credit card :mad: . It's a scenario you read about in the papers but something I never thought would happen to ours. Got to get it off her somehow :mad: !!

EDITED:
Just registered them with both - thanks very much!

Jays

This can be a big problem, there was a TV programme looking into this a few months ago. Unfortunately, there is not much you can do unless you can hide it!!

The programme looked into families trying to get mail re-directed to someone else in the family but they needed their elderly person's permission - would your mother agree to this? If so, you can do this at the post office, they have a form you fill in and you may have to pay a small fee.

Whilst I visited my mother she asked me to go through all her piles of mail, I discovered she had signed up to duplicate policies to cover plumbing leaks etc. Whilst I was sat with her I telephoned the companies and explained the problem, they asked to speak to my mum to get her permission to talk to me (which she agreed to) and we sorted it all out, including refunds, which was great.

I have also had to sort out her credit/debit care PINs which she was terrified of, but we sorted them out between us - luckily, I know she uses them as a last resort and sensibly so I don't worry about those at the moment.

I also found she had ordered clothes from catalogues, but was only paying the minimal each money even with money sat in her bank account. So I explained the situation to her, she was horrified to discover she would be paying back more than if she just paid off the whole amount. I discovered they had added penalities for the time she was in hospital, so after a phone call I was able to get that taken off too.

The point is you cannot do anything without her permission, each time I telephoned on her behalf they wanted her permission to talk about her affairs. It's fair enough generally, as I wouldn't want my children changing my banking arrangements, but when they get elderly you aren't sure they always understand all the implications of what they do.

Incidentally, my mother has given my brother and me, power of attorney, so if she cannot manage her affairs for example is in long term hospital care etc, we can sort them out for her. Should you be thinking about this with your mother?

I'm due to visit my mum this weekend in your neck of the woods (Cheshire) from Hampshire, so may end up sorting another pile of papers, who knows....

Good luck with you mother,
Jays

Sorry, just re-read your initial post, I didn't mean to leave your dad out !

Claudie

Lara some companies prepare their marketing campaigns up to 8-12 weeks in advance; it can sometimes take several weeks before you actually notice the unwanted post starting to diminish!

Also, a lot of the catalogues and weekend supplements are notorious for keeping names and selling them on. It may be worth keeping an eye on those as well. A lot of the elderly don't realise that by placing a seemingly simple order they are getting their name back out there. Even if you register, imho it is sometimes worth reregistering about 6 months later.

IClaudius

Lara, I'm registered with both and whilst it does take a while, eventually you do really see a difference. Good luck and here's the link for anyone else wanting to register

Mail preference service

Telephone preference service


:T

Lara

Thanks everyone for your helpful comments. Very much appreciated:). I have registered her with phone and mail preference sites but apparently although the mail stops all UK junk it doesn't stop the American & Canadian junk and that is where the majority of it comes from.

From Jays:
I also found she had ordered clothes from catalogues, but was only paying the minimal each money even with money sat in her bank account. So I explained the situation to her, she was horrified to discover she would be paying back more than if she just paid off the whole amount. I discovered they had added penalities for the time she was in hospital, so after a phone call I was able to get that taken off too.

The point is you cannot do anything without her permission, each time I telephoned on her behalf they wanted her permission to talk about her affairs. It's fair enough generally, as I wouldn't want my children changing my banking arrangements, but when they get elderly you aren't sure they always understand all the implications of what they do.

mmmmmmmmm that appears to be the case with her aswell!! The problem is she thinks she knows it all (now I sound like her mother! lol) and whenever you ask her about this she says she doesn't buy anything but my Dad says differently. My sister lives just 5 mins drive away whereas I am much further away so she is going to have a private word with my Dad and ask him to keep all the mail so that she can look through it. Apparently he posts the letters for her because...............................Mum's put a stamp on it and he won't waste money! Although they are 80 this year they are "old" in their ways and very very set in their ways and to sit down and try and talk about these things with both of them (we have tried in the past) is almost impossible!!! I think I might be going very grey from now!

steve_r123

We used to get LOADS of junk mail through for the previous tenants at our flat...... We just cross out the address, and then write on it 'No Longer At This Address' then put it back in the postbox, and it has cut down a lot.

Maybe this is worth trying....only on the junk mail of course!

Lara

Thanks - that is another possibility but if the letters have come from USA & Canada who pays to send them back . Possibly they don't get sent back in which case we may just aswell bin it - if we can get hold of it! :rolleyes:

Jays

Lara wrote:

Thanks - that is another possibility but if the letters have come from USA & Canada who pays to send them back . Possibly they don't get sent back in which case we may just aswell bin it - if we can get hold of it! :rolleyes:

Do any of these come with pre-paid reply envelopes? In the past I have written very clearly 'remove from mailing list' and over stuffed the envelopes with junk mail, and posted them back. As the envelopes weigh more than the reply stamp, they have to pay extra. This stopped the two Canadian companies I received mail from.