Online postage service launched
People will be able to buy their postage online, without any stamps, for the first time under a new initiative from the Royal Mail.
Customers will be able to pay for their postage by credit card over the internet for first-class, second-class and international deliveries. Each item of mail will be given a special barcode, which can be printed off at home, before being posted. Royal Mail said the scheme would improve choice for its customers.
The service will be available 24 hours a day and it is hoped it will reduce queues in post offices. Postage purchased online will cost no more than the normal rates. Royal Mail, whose monopoly on postal deliveries ended at the start of the year, said it believed the service would appeal particularly to home workers and to people who sell goods via eBay and other auction sites. (BBC News Online)
I definitely welcome this because I do sell books that I don't want to keep on ebay and I'm always too lazy to go to the post office to get the stamps.
I can also still go out and buy those nice birthday cards at Memory Lane or Clinton Cards and post it straightaway in a nearby postbox because the bar code stamp will already be in my handbag - printed at home.
Looks like in the future stamps will become a rare thing and the value of old stamps will increase. So if you were planning to throw out your husband's childhood stamp collection - you may want to think again. And it may be worth it to keep those nice stamps you're still getting on your mail - at the very least, as a reminder that they once exist.
2 comments:
Hey this is cool, indeed. How very convenient...
The downside however, is that I've just started my daughter on a new hobby - stamp collection. In future, there will be no more stamps to collect. And my other children will not have the chance to enjoy this special little hobby. How sad...
Yes, stamp collecting is a good hobby, actually. I bet most children nowadays will answer the question 'what's your hobby?' with 'playing computer games' for conventional hobbies like this one has long been neglected, don't u think?
But not to worry abt your daughter's collection, I'm sure many countries will still be producing stamps until she is old enough to find other hobbies like reading, music and make up heheh...
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