OF GENERAL INTEREST.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLIII, Issue 59, 5 March 1909, Page 4

OF GENERAL INTEREST.

A notice of special interest to the public has just been issued,from the General Post Office. It is,well known that the Department, by'means of a conspicuous notice placed over every posting-box in the Dominion, cautions the public against sending money and valuable articles in unregistered letters. Notwithstanding this warning, money continues to be sent by post in unregistered letters in the roost careless manner. It will hardly be credited by people.;}(who exercise ordinary prudence in such matters that it is a jcommon thine; to find in the post office letters crammed full with banknotes, very often in the flimsiest of covers. Frequently the contents protrude from the envelopes, or are found loose in the mail-bags, having burst their envelopes;, and letters filled with notes are often carelessly thrown loos© into railway-vans for the guard to deliver with the mails. Many other cases could be instanced by the authorities of carelessness on the part of the public in sending money by post. _It often happens that letters containing money are alleged to have been lost in the post office, and it has generally been proved that such letters were either not posted, or were mislaid or lost after due delivery. When aii unregistered money-letter, alleged to have been sent by post, is reported missing, it may happen that suspicion is cast on every one concerned—viz., on the person supposed to have posted the letter, the officers of the post office through whose hands the letter would pass, and the person who would in ordinary course receive the letter from the post office, either from tho street-door letter-box or a private letter-box, over the post office counter, or from tlifi hands of a letter- j carrier. No record is kept of unregistered letters, and persons who

post such letters containing money expose to temptation every one through Avhose hands they may pass, and in the event of non-delivery suspicion is cast on many innocent persons. The public are therefore requested by the Department to register all letters containing money or valuables intended to be seat by post. As receipts are given for registered letters, the letters are traced from hand to hand, and a receipt obtained on delivery, therefore it is very rarely that a registered letter is lost.