Dear LPG,

I am a pensioner but also a dutiful daughter I hope.  The other day a couple of my mother’s friends came to visit and while we were having a chat, we got onto the subject of just how many letters we older people seem to get.  

My Mum is in her late eighties while I have only just retired but it is true she does get at least double the amount of mail that I do most days.  I am quite old fashioned and still insist on getting posted paper utility bills which means that I do get quite a few letters myself, but my couple of letters at most per day pale into insignificance when you take her daily wad of envelopes into consideration.

I have decided that there are two reasons for this and when you take a good look at differences in the type of mail we receive they can be easily seen.

We all get junk mail, but she gets a lot more than me and her daily mail delivery can be categorised.  She gets three types of mail.

1, Real mail         (Bank statements, letters from the odd friend and other official letters)

2, Sale mail     (letters trying to sell her things, including catalogues that she has ordered stuff from) 

3, charity mail    (you only have to give once and then you are on their mailing list for life)

I get the real mail and I suppose that I do more ordering online than my Mum, but I do have a few companies that plague me with letters though.  About six years ago, I made the mistake of ordering a holiday brochure to be sent to my address and, even though I decided against going on holiday with them, I still get at least one letter a week offering their latest breaks.  I have even phoned them to tell them that they are wasting their time, but it is so much easier to be added than taken off of a mailing list. 

When it comes to charity mail, I have decided that it is better to give as anonymously as possible.  The secret is to return the envelopes that you do get without the letters which include your name and address but with just the financial insert.

I still send money to some of those charities that ask for ‘just two or three pounds a month’ as they put it, but rather than filling in their direct debit mandate, I send a postal order for £30 or £40 because they then cannot trace the donation back to me.   The advantages are that they get their annual request all in one go and I don’t get plagued with as many repeated begging letters because they cannot trace me from my donation.  It does cost about 12.5 % extra but to my mind, adding an extra 60p to the cost of sending the annual ‘just two pounds a month, is well worth it.

KR, Penge

LPG found some information about Postal Orders… 

(►►►)