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Author Topic: Is this True????  (Read 5053 times)

moranacus

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Is this True????
« on: February 02, 2010, 01:00 AM »
I collect postmarks as well as QSL cards from HAM OPERATORS.
When I called the post office today they said that they now only
put the date and time the letter was mailed and not the city and state.
This doesn't sound right to me.
I believe that if a city has its own zip code then that city and state
would be on the letter mailed.
Which is right????

app103

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Re: Is this True????
« Reply #1 on: March 11, 2010, 06:13 PM »
I grabbed a stack of stuff received within the last 30 days, and most didn't even have a post mark of any sort (permit numbers, instead)

The stuff that did have a post mark all seemed to have the date, time, and zip code. There was no city or state, but I am assuming if you wanted that info, that could be found with the zip code that was included in the post mark.

40hz

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Re: Is this True????
« Reply #2 on: March 11, 2010, 06:40 PM »
A lot of towns and smaller cities are now redirecting their mail to regional centers for processing. It's my understanding that if a letter goes there you'll only get the generic date/time postmark.

In many cases however, you can still get a local postmark  if: (a) you can persuade an employee at the local post office to hand cancel your letter - and (b) said employee can actually find the office's postmark stamp.

All the offices have hand stamps. But if it hasn't been used in years and is buried in the back of some drawer, you may be out of luck.

 :)




« Last Edit: March 11, 2010, 06:43 PM by 40hz »

Shades

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Re: Is this True????
« Reply #3 on: March 11, 2010, 06:58 PM »
I know that the Dutch postal system only requires the zipcode and house number. Once that is know, they are able to deliver. The extra postage information makes it a lot easier and faster for them.

1234 AB (generic format of a Dutch zip code)

first digit stands for one of the 10 main regions in the country
second digit stands for one of the 10 sub-regions in a main region
third digit stands for one of the 10 regions in a sub-sub-region
fourth digit stands for one of the 10 regions in a sub-sub-sub-region

This sub-sub-sub-region is divided into 26x26 blocks. Believe me, you are by now already on street name level. By now the only thing essential is the house number. Once they know that, they can deliver.

The US is "slightly" bigger than Holland, so they require extra digits I assume. One or two should suffice.

Carol Haynes

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Re: Is this True????
« Reply #4 on: March 11, 2010, 07:14 PM »
I know that the Dutch postal system only requires the zipcode and house number.

Same is true in the UK (except we have postcodes not zip codes). The postcode is unique to a handful of properties and then the identifier for the property is sufficient - at least in theory. In practice I guess most postal workers use the full address once it has got to the nearest delivery office.

f0dder

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Re: Is this True????
« Reply #5 on: March 12, 2010, 05:01 AM »
Sounds like the Dutch zipcodes are very well organized, nice. The Danish 4-digit postcodes only define the city.

We've had centralized sorting for many years, though, with just four regional centers handling the physical mail - so even if you send a letter from/to Skagen (the northernmost part of Denmark), it takes a roundtrip through Aarhus. For packages, there's only two regional centers.

95% or more of all letters (I'm not of today's stats) are sorted at these four centers; the bulk is handled automatically by Siemen's Incentive OCR software and some Really Frigging Big MachinesTM. The stuff Incentive is unsure about is handled by humans, but still done on computers, with a pretty nifty system. And the rest, the really nasty incomprehensive stuff, is "city-sorted" manually, hands-on.

The end result is that the city post offices/distribution centers get a bunch of trays with pre-sorted stacks of letters, and the individual postmen can just grab their stack(s) of letters, jump on their bikes, and know that the letters are sorted in route order. Of course there's always a few letters that have to be hand-sorted at the local post offices, but that's because there's so many MORONIC, FSCKTARDED, PARKINSONS-DISEASE-INFLICTED, HEADSHOT-WORTHY individuals who have incomprehensible writing, get postcodes/housenumbers/streetnames/names wrong, et cetera. "To grandma & grandad, the yellow house at wurnglyspeltstrnaym" - and missing the postcode because they don't feel it's necessary because they live in the same town. Please go shoot yourselves.
- carpe noctem

cranioscopical

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Re: Is this True????
« Reply #6 on: March 12, 2010, 09:51 AM »
"To grandma & grandad, the yellow house at wurnglyspeltstrnaym"
-f0dder
That's just stupid, I agree!
I'd never do that!
My grandma & grandad live in the blue house!