Saturday, April 16, 2011
A £7,900 slap for Tonbridge Blog!
Someone who lives in Rose Street, Tonbridge (you know who you are!) cost me £1.58 this morning. A great start to my Saturday I must say! I got a Royal Mail unpaid postage slip through my shop door the other day and had to go to the post depot this morning. This hardly ever happens so I was curious to know what it could be; maybe someone requesting a book had just forgotten to stick his stamps on the letter. But actually no. Once I'd coughed up my money which, by the way, included a £1 "handling fee" by our dear post office I opened it to discover a copy of the Tonbridge Insider and scrawled across the front in no uncertain terms the recipient had written that they did not want to receive their free copy any more. If they were so bothered wouldn't it have been far easier just to put it in the bin rather than go to all the effort of posting it? Or does this person have a right to demand not to receive the magazine? If so surely we'd have to apply the same rights to every other bit of junk mail that landed on our door mats wouldn't we? As far as I know it would be quite a problem, if not impossible, stopping one household receiving their copy. Just in case anyone else is thinking of playing this same trick on TonbridgeBlog spare a thought for me as you see I only write for the magazine I don't run it! The editor's details are in the back of the magazine if you feel that strongly. I'll be suprised if there are many more people who don't think it worth at least a quick read as there is, after all, quite a lot of information about local events in there if nothing else. If all 5,000 of the circulation don't like it though that £1.58 extra postage could turn out to be a rather hefty £7,900. I'd better steer clear of the post depot for a bit!...
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5 comments:
There are three options available to anyone who wants to stop, or at least cut down on the amount of unwanted junk mail. So in answer to your question: Does this person have a right to demand not to receive the magazine....the answer is yes, he does. http://www.stopjunkmail.org.uk/guide/mps.php
The way I read it the answer is Yes, well, maybe not! It seems from that site that you can opt out of the Royal Mail leaflets (with difficulty by all accounts) but only politely request to have no junk mail or no commercial leaflets. But then where do the distributors of say, free newspapers, magazines and political leaflets stand on that. What about notiications about gas works and planning permission petitions as other examples? There must be many more. This is a complete minefield!...
I agree, it's very impractical, and it's no wonder the Royal Mail don't advertise it. It would make things very complicated for them if it ever caught on...say if a third of the population opted for the door to door service or the mailing preference service..or both, it would mean the Royal Mail would have to entirely change it's system. After all...junk mail is the Royal Mail's bread and butter.
In THEORY, however..it's possible....
Maybe the person in Rose Street should invest in one of those "no junk mail or any other such shit" stickers you can put on your front door..
P.S
I've never had a copy of Tonbridge Insider delivered, despite the fact that I've never taken any of the options available on that site..Although I have seen the online version...Seems ok to me..
I love reading the TI every time it comes through my door - keep up the good work! Dare I say the adverts are interesting too!
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