TELEGRAMS IN BRITAIN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20767, 9 January 1931, Page 13

TELEGRAMS IN BRITAIN.

POPULARISING SCHEME.

NEW ATTRACTIONS

Ambitious plans to save the telegraph service, which is now losing more than £1,000.000 a year, are at last' being drawn up by the British Postal Department. Two years ago five senior officials of the Post Office went to America to study the systems of privately-owned companies there. They were away about three months, and some time after their return a long report was laid before the Post-master-General. Cautious consideration of the revolutionary suggestions contained in these recommendations has continued ever since. The authorities were asked to sanction:— Nation-wide advertising, the introduction of special Christmas greeting rates and attractive envelopes and forms, increased facilities for business offices, more rapid transit by messenger, and the "Teleprinter," which typewrites a message by wire direct from the sender's premises to the transmitting room at the General Post Office. The British public, it has now been decided, should be educated to accept a telegram not with the excitement or dread of an unusual or an alarming experience, but as a matter-of-course, widelyused public service. Advertising is, therefore, a part of the scheme in preparation. "The policy now being drafted is the culmination of considerable work and study," an official said recently. "We started to-day with an extension of our picture transmission to Germany, and we are able now to forward photographs, drawings, and printed matter in facsimile form from almost any part of Europe to America. Other attractions will be introduced shortly."