Return Mail

Foreign experience

Typically, non-delivery and return of a postal item occurs due to non-observance of postal rules, incomplete indication of the address and return address, or inability to it, when both the addressee and the sender have left before the postal item has been delivered. Basically, relying on the British model that emerged at the end of the XVIII century, many countries have developed similar systems for processing unstructured mail.

The term “dead mail”, which is widespread in English-speaking countries, may not be accurate, therefore a number of such countries have chosen to use the term “undeliverable mail” (“undeliverable mail”), since it more clearly reflects the status of the dispatch, the forwarding of which turned out to be impossible. Due to the fact that the departments of non-created mailings are internal structural units within the postal administrations, little information has been published about them. Recently, several articles in journals have appeared in English on this subject and at least one book has been published (in Canada ) ^{[1] [2]} .

Assignment to non-created mailings is one of the rare examples when postal employees are allowed to violate the secrecy of correspondence , allegedly in search of clues about the place of departure or destination of the mailing. States are also developing rules for the destruction of unsolicited mail, especially when they contain values. Surprisingly, some very valuable items were found in the unpacked mail , for example, a stolen painting by Marc Chagall , which was found in the mail sorting center of the US Postal Service in Topic ^[3] .

Russian experience

In the practice of Russian mail , the following concepts are used ^[4] :

“Unclaimed postal item” means a postal item that was impossible to deliver (deliver) to the addressee, and upon returning to the return address, to the sender, or a postal item from among those that were not created after it was opened and the address data of the addressee and the sender were not established.

“Uncreated postal item” means a postal item that was impossible to deliver (deliver) to the addressee and, due to the lack of address data, return to the sender.

The procedure for processing such items in post offices is regulated by the relevant intra-departmental rules, approved on the basis of federal law and international conventions.

The procedure for processing returned mail is usually regulated by the postal rules in force in a particular country. And although the goal of all the marks applied is the same, the methods are different:

• handwritten inscriptions
• special “return stamps”,
• stamps
• mailing labels
• stickers printed by the addressee company itself.

It can be expected that with the growth of collecting and studying postal marks (for example, reverse stamps ) of such departments, the volume of literature on this little-studied topic will grow. Many countries, including Canada and the United States , have issued special vignettes ( reverse stamps ) for envelopes that have passed through the department of non-built mail. Collectors highly appreciate non-philatelic postal items, although quicklime vignettes are often relatively common because they have no postal value.

People interested in mail around the world sometimes send letters to fictitious addresses around the world to see if the postal service of a particular country returns the mail to the sender. Postmark collectors also resort to this method to get unusual postal notes that are rarely found in regular mail.

• Gross O., Gryzhevsky K. IV. In a kaleidoscope of stamps. Reverse stamps // Travels in the world of stamps / O. Gross, K. Gryzhevsky; Per. from polish. Yu. M. Sokolov with abbr. - M .: Progress , 1977 .-- 50,000 copies. (Retrieved June 23, 2016) Archival copy of August 9, 2016 on the Wayback Machine
• Inverse stamp // Large Philatelic Dictionary / N. I. Vladinets, L. I. Ilyichev, I. Ya. Levitas ... [and others ] ; under the general. ed. N.I. Vladinets and V.A. Jacobs. - M .: Radio and communications, 1988 .-- 320 p. - 40,000 copies. - ISBN 5-256-00175-2 .

• Russian Post Website (Retrieved January 30, 2009) :
  • Federal law on postal services (Article 21. Special conditions for the provision of postal services)
  • Universal Postal Union Convention and Agreement (Article RP 138. Return of Undelivered Parcels to the Sender)
• Innovation and Entrepreneurship Website (Retrieved January 30, 2009) :
  • Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation of September 26, 2000 No. 725 “On approval of the Rules for the provision of postal services” (Article 1)
  • Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation of April 15, 2005 No. 221 “On approval of the Rules for the provision of postal services” (Articles 29, 35, 36, 38, 39, 56)
  • Order of the Ministry of the Russian Federation for Communications and Informatization of October 31, 2003 No. 128 “On Settlement between Federal Postal Service Organizations for Postal Services” (Article 2.5. Settlements for postal items returned to senders (parcels and parcels with declared value) and Table P. 2.1)