To think stamp barcodes will reduce the number of poison-pen letters.

[thirdlaw]

Royal Mail have introduced bar codes on their stamps. Each stamp is now uniquely identifiable. The barcodes don't contain any personal information, but it will presumably be possible to determine the location and time of purchase, assuming the retailer scans the barcode on the book of stamps when you buy it. Aibu to think this will make people think twice about sending poison pen letters, especially the ones that might be nasty enough to warrant police investigation?

I haven't seen this mentioned anywhere - Royal Mail just say they are to improve security, with no detail on what they mean by that.

Royal mail staff are given big sheets of stamps every Christmas.

We have about 200 stamps in our house - very tempting to sell them on!

Is every single card/letter scanned to see if the stamp has been used before?

😂😂

Ahhh, but you see most poison pen letters are not sent by post, they are slipped under the door, pinned to a cardigan in the changing rooms during a hockey match, or at the bottom of a tuckbox. Anyone who read boarding school stories knows this!

@Pinkflipflop85 Wow! I had no idea, Perk of the job I guess!

I suspect so. But the end user can't tell which has been scanned and which hasn't.

Letters 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Ah but surely the best way to trace the writer of a poisen pen letter is to look carefully at the typeface of all the words and letters and figure out which magazine they have been cut out of. Then you ask the lady in the newsagents if she can recall who bought a copy of, say, Horse and Hound recently. Bingo.

They don't scan each stamp when they sell them. That would take ages.
I was sent a poison pen letter about 10 years ago. It was quite exciting 😂

How can the bar coding stop the stamp being reused? Surely not every single stamp out of the thousands and thousands sold will have a unique code on it?

I like your way better.

😂

news.sky.com/story/royal-mail-adds-barcodes-to-stamps-allowing-people-to-watch-videos-or-see-messages-from-senders-12530063
It's not to stop people from using them twice

Why wouldn't each one have an identification number?

What would be the point of doing the code on everystamp otherwise?

Do you get a lot of poison pen letters op? Maybe it's you

But you'll agree stopping reuse is a possible bonus?

Actually my ex was "victim" to a poison pen letter a couple of years ago they sent a letter to his girlfriend place of work detailing all his arrests they were unimpressed by her choice of partner

At nearly £1 for a first class stamp I doubt if someone with an axe to grind would waste their time and money on buying a stamp, unless they were truly deranged.

You can't even buy books of twelve now, the new stamps are bigger so you only get eight.

Is this what you do when you write your nasty letters? 🤣🤣🤣. You seem to have is all sussed.

I actually received poison pen letters over the past 3 years!
After they became increasingly worse and started making threats towards me and my children I reported them to the police. They spoke with the person we suspected was sending them and surprise surprise they stopped!

I might be in the minority but they definitely still exist!

Why would anyone bother sending a poison pen letter when they have the whole internet to play with? But if I ever decide to send one, I'll be sure to steal someone else's stamp

In any case, not all stamps will have barcodes, special issues (with pictures celebrating particular people, events etc.) will not have barcodes. So the butler's niece's ex-husband's estranged mother's secret lover's gardener just needs to stock up on those.

If I was to send a poison pen letter I would just not bother putting a stamp on, then they can have the letter and pay for the privilege, without costing me anything.

Bloody hell....clutching at straws here op! Are you bored?