Post Office fraud?

Jellicle

I sent a package to a buyer and got a nice email from him telling me that the Post Office had charged him £1.21 claiming that the stamp I had stuck on it had already been used ("invisibly marked guv").

In fact the stamp was a new one I had removed from another package which I had not yet sent, but I had been a bit lazy and had cut it off with a border of brown paper which I stuck to the (white) package I'd sent.

Looking at the buyers very good feedback and the reasonable email he had sent me I decided to refund his £1.21 to avoid any hassle, even though it wiped out my profit margin.

As far as I know the Post Office don't use any form of "invisible marking" ... (what would be the point of it since they endeavour to 'frank' the stamps with ink anyway, and delivery operatives are instructed to use a pen on any they spot that the franking process has missed)

? Has the Post Office operated this "scam" on anyone else ?
... or do they indeed use "invisible marking"...

misty

I wouldn't say it was a scam - you say yourself you left a bit of brown paper round it - they may assume it was reused. I would steam it off next time.

sarahlouise210

Ok..so you left some brown paper on the stamp but that does not prove it has been used..just that you had stuck it on one wrapping and then decided to use another. It would be too costly and unnecesary to invisibly mark every item posted. I have checked on the post office website and it says that if not enough postage is used by the sender then the item is weighed and usually charged at 2nd class plus a £1.00 admin charge. This would mean that your parcel only would have cost 21p to send..does this sound right?? If not it all seems odd. I would complain to Royal Mail stating that they have made assumptions without any proof of fraud-they have in fact stolen your money(your stamp) Of course in practise it is not worth the effort for the amount involved but still..... you could write the complaint letter but not put a stamp on it!!

poppit_2

The best way of removing stamps from envolopes and parcels is tear carefully around then on the paper (to remove) then take a saucer of water leave to soak for 10 minutes and they peel off from the brown paper and can then be reused if not post officed stamped i do this for charitys that collect stamps before anyone thinks different. lol

robstoff

Jelliclle

I think that they do use "invisible marking". Have you ever noticed the black dots, on most stamps that have been used. I think thy a phosphorous dots. If you look very close you may see a small amount of this. Even if you couldnt see it, it was probably there, and would have been rejected by the sorting machine.
I totally empathise with you, but you did use a second hand stamp, and your gamble didnt pay off, what a shame though!

Rob.

RACHIE77

robstoff wrote:

Jelliclle

I think that they do use "invisible marking". Have you ever noticed the black dots, on most stamps that have been used. I think thy a phosphorous dots. If you look very close you may see a small amount of this. Even if you couldnt see it, it was probably there, and would have been rejected by the sorting machine.
I totally empathise with you, but you did use a second hand stamp, and your gamble didnt pay off, what a shame though!

Rob.

I think the stamp was a new one Rob?? :money:

tentickles666

if they use invisible marking its new, within the last year. my sister and i decided to see how many times you can use a stamp, each time using the same oine just sending it back and forth, we did tis about 10 times before we got bored lol so unless its new i think they were just making an 'educated' guess because of the brown packing

Jellicle

helenathena wrote:

if they use invisible marking its new, within the last year. my sister and i decided to see how many times you can use a stamp, each time using the same oine just sending it back and forth, we did this about 10 times before we got bored lol so unless its new i think they were just making an 'educated' guess because of the brown packing

Thanks for telling us this HelenAthena, it confirms what I thought: that the GPO just decided to apply an extra charge to boost their profits. The stamp I used was in fact an 'unused' one which I'd stuck on the wrong parcel.

- I'm surprised no-one else (reading this thread) seems to have experienced this though.

sarahlouise210

No-one else has experienced this as we do not leave brown paper on our new (or old!) stamps:rotfl:

shelly

Jellicle.Hubby hasn't had exactly the same happen but along the same sort of lines.We were sending parcels in grey plastic bags and PO cashiers were sticking on the little stamps.A few buyers got back to us saying that they had to pay to collect the parcel from their sorting office as we hadn't put any stamps on it.The stamps had fallen off in transit.We had proof of posting so we know we paid postage on it but like you we refunded the buyers as they were nice about it.We now use the bigish stamps that the machines print and they are really sticky....lol....I think RM will make a few quid where ever they can.

1jim

we have had same problem as shelley, we use the plastic mailers and if the post office stick on stamps they fall off in transit but the printed stamps stay on, it really annoys the post office when you ask for the printed stamp rather than the stamps they use