Royal Mail: Free redelivery/redirection anywhere?

DrScotsman

Okay, nothing to do with eBay and the like, but I don't really think there's a better board for Royal Mail questions, is there?

My girlfriend got a birthday card sent to her parents' house. Her mum told her that she'd forward it on. She received the card and...all her mum's done has crossed out the original address and put on the correct address. No new stamp, no new postmark. My girlfriend acts like this is normal, but I'm really confused! (EDIT: Forgot to mention, the cities are different let alone the post code area)

Now forgive me if this is something stupidly obvious that Royal Mail have been doing for decades, but I'm not that old and I can't find anywhere on their website where it says you can do this. I know that you can do "NOT KNOWN AT THIS ADDRESS" to get something returned to sender, or "MISDELIVERED" to something delivered to the wrong address. And I know you could probably cheat and use one of those two to achieve this goal, but that definitely hasn't happened here.

Someone clue me in here please. I would love the mail at my parents' house getting down here for free, but I'm not taking any risks!

(Isn't this really open to abuse?)

F&L

When I moved house years ago I left "please forward to" labels with the new owner in case some mail slipped through the redirection service. They still forward junk mail with these labels and I still get mail this way. I've always assumed this is perfectly okay to do but maybe others know differently?

custardy

DrScotsman wrote: »

Okay, nothing to do with eBay and the like, but I don't really think there's a better board for Royal Mail questions, is there?

My girlfriend got a birthday card sent to her parents' house. Her mum told her that she'd forward it on. She received the card and...all her mum's done has crossed out the original address and put on the correct address. No new stamp, no new postmark. My girlfriend acts like this is normal, but I'm really confused! (EDIT: Forgot to mention, the cities are different let alone the post code area)

Now forgive me if this is something stupidly obvious that Royal Mail have been doing for decades, but I'm not that old and I can't find anywhere on their website where it says you can do this. I know that you can do "NOT KNOWN AT THIS ADDRESS" to get something returned to sender, or "MISDELIVERED" to something delivered to the wrong address. And I know you could probably cheat and use one of those two to achieve this goal, but that definitely hasn't happened here.

Someone clue me in here please. I would love the mail at my parents' house getting down here for free, but I'm not taking any risks!

(Isn't this really open to abuse?)

yes very much so
however RM are more interested in cutting staff and tearing down the service than close this (which it is) total abuse of the system
it gets worse though,consider all the mail sent through competitors,RM loose money on those items of mail
so if someone then unofficially redirects that mail then think how much its costs
for me any unofficially redirected mail should be charged as unpaid or returned to sender
if any mail came back to my duty that ihad delivered but was the redirected then it and any further mail for that person got condemned as gone away

many people see it as the norm,but this is a throwback to a publically owned and funded RM,probably the same people moan RM needs to be modernised etc
if you want the mail from your parents house then contact the companies and change the address?

F&L wrote: »

When I moved house years ago I left "please forward to" labels with the new owner in case some mail slipped through the redirection service. They still forward junk mail with these labels and I still get mail this way. I've always assumed this is perfectly okay to do but maybe others know differently?

well if you are not paying for it,why would you think its okay?

DrScotsman

custardy wrote: »

if you want the mail from your parents house then contact the companies and change the address?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not lazy and I aim to do this. Some things just slip through the radar. And as per my original post, some relatives don't see a problem with sending things to the parents' address far away (and you can hardly say "Thank you for the card, here's my address")

Not to mention in all fairness, general consensus on this forum is that students should apply for everything credit-related at their parents' address to boost their credit rating (more likely to be on electoral roll, not rented accommodation, same address for a long period of time etc.). In fact I have a feeling one of Martin's articles suggests to do this. I decided to go against this rule (I like to receive my mail fast, some shops only deliver to billing address on a card, easy proof of address from statements), but most students won't.

cyberbob

yes they can do it. We occasionally get the odd letter this way from my wife's parents.

appleblossom

when we moved in we used to cross out our address for any post for the previous owner and just write NATA - xx xxxxxxxxx, xxxxxxxx and put it back in the post and he got it all.

We did do a redirection service for our post but also left some SAE A4 envelopes to forward on any that slipped through.

I have also received post where the address has been crossed though and re-written.

There is no way of cheating the system to get your post to your parents free though as you have to have the letter stamped in the first place for it to reach a destination where it could be redirected from (does that make sense!) so it would be impossible to send post for free.

DrScotsman

appleblossom wrote: »

There is no way of cheating the system to get your post to your parents free though as you have to have the letter stamped in the first place for it to reach a destination where it could be redirected from (does that make sense!) so it would be impossible to send post for free.

If anyone sent me a letter then I could open it, reseal with a new letter inside, cross out my address and put whoever I want to send it to and then presto, every letter I receive = one free letter.

Not that I'd so such a fraudulent thing of course, just demonstrating the possibility.

custardy

DrScotsman wrote: »

If anyone sent me a letter then I could open it, reseal with a new letter inside, cross out my address and put whoever I want to send it to and then presto, every letter I receive = one free letter.

Not that I'd so such a fraudulent thing of course, just demonstrating the possibility.

once opened the letter is liable for charge

DrScotsman

custardy wrote: »

once opened the letter is liable for charge

I'm sure it wouldn't be too hard to get around something like that.

I mean if the steaming-an-envelope thing that works in movies so often actually works IRL, it'd be easy

custardy

people can do as they please,ive seen plenty crying at getting charged for unofficial redirections
if it were down to me they would have an accessable database to confirm the redirections and charge any item thats unpaid
its worth millions every year
but people want a modernised service whilst nothing changes for them

Dizzie77

I have to say that I'd never considered the cost implication to RM....

When I moved into my place, I forwarded post for the previous occupant for about a year - just crossing out my address and writing on his new one. After that, I've just returned to sender.