Inadequate Addresses Worry Postal Officials

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28167, 4 January 1957, Page 5

Inadequate Addresses Worry Postal Officials

“How to Stop Worrying and Start Living” is the title of one of the books that is now causing worry to officers of the returned letter office at the Chief Post Office, Christchurch. This is only one of several books that has broken out of badly-packed parcels of Christmas mail. Yesterday, 68 different articles, including a toy watch, children’s frocks, tins of cigarettes, a tin of assorted biscuits, various brooches and ornaments, a copy of “Alice in Wonderland,” with other books and a pair of socks “To Mick, from Mum,” were in the cupboards of the returned letter office. They had all come out of badly-packed parcels, and the owners cannot be traced.

“Some persons try to wrap a shoe box with a piece of paper about big enough to wrap a match box,” said an official ruefully. “We have had a person on the staff over the Christmas period with a full-time job just rewrapping parcels.” Intact Parcels Apart from these articles that have fallen from parcels, there are also many intact parcels lying in the office because they bear insufficient addresses, or because, the intended recipients have left the address and cannot be traced. “Miss Smith, 150 , St. Albans,” is a typical example ol the type of parcel from which the street name is omitted, and perhaps some expensive item ol clothing is contained in it. Another is addressed to a person al “No. 4 R.D.,” which could be any one of many places in New Zealand, for there are many No. 4 Rural Deliveries, attached to various post offices. Some parcels wrapped in brightly-coloured paper and tied with the most atrtactive of ribbons have no address at all. One package contains three highly-priced cardigans, and another has some pretty rag dolls for children. The Post Office goes to a great deal of trouble to trace either the intended recipients of the parcels or, if that fails, the senders. Postmen do the first part of the searching, and there is a “call-out’ of such parcels each morning to see whether any postman recognises the name of a householder or a street. Parcels that eventually reach the returned letter office are opened to see whether there is any further evidence or some clue as to the address of the sender. Stamps such as “Gone, no address,” “Insufficient address,” or “Not known,” are used, and when every avenue has been investigated, the parcels are sent to the letter office clearing house at

the General Post Office, Wellington. Thousands of Cards But the biggest headache for postal officials are the many thousands of Christmas cards with incorrect addresses, and in some cases no addresses. Some were seen yesterday with just “Judith,” “Frances,” or other names, but no address and no stamp. Already 6000 such cards have been sent to Wellington, and many others will still have to go, because many have yet to be returned from other offices in the Christchurch postal district. “It would help a lot if persons would adopt the practice of writing their own names and addresses on the backs of letters or cards; they would not believe the mistakes they make,” said an official.