OVERSEAS MAILS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23828, 7 June 1939, Page 3

OVERSEAS MAILS

UNDERPAID LETTER PROBLEMS A RECENT IMPROVEMENT After months of effort to reduce the proportion of underpaid correspondence despatched in overseas mails, the Post Office is able to report a definite improvement in the position. Constan, attention has been called in the press to the high percentage of correspondence addressed to the United States of America bearing a Id stamp instead of the international postal rate of 2£d. this being the principal difficulty following the revision of overseas postase rates which took place almost a year ago. Underpaid cor respondence to this country used frequently to exceed a quarter of the total volume, and thousands of letters have been returned to the senders in New Zealand, the addressees refusing to pay the double deficiency charge, usually 3d. The most recent check taken at Auckland and Wellington, where New Zealand's overseas mails are finally handled, shows that underpaid letters addressed to U.SA. have dropped from 25 to about 12 per cent, of the total. There is still failure to comply fully with the lid per half oz. rate to Empire countries, deficiencies of 6 per cent, being shown in the latest examination of these mails. In the office of the New Zealand High Commissioner in London, much used as a centre for correspondence of New Zealanders visiting the Homeland, .no fewer than 200 letters arriving from the Dominion by one recent mail had to be surcharged, causing a great deal of extra work to the postal authorities and the High Commissioner's staff. An effective demonstration of how much can be sent by post on the Empire service at the rate of ljd per half oz. has been provided by the British Broadcasting Corporation, which circulates to Empire readers a 12-page illustrated publication weighing less than the limit