I WANT ANSWERS to a serious question.
Why doesn't everyone run the Return Address scam with posted letters? Why do we not all write in the 'To' person in the return address box and then slap some insufficient postage on it? Or no postage at all?
I've never done this; lawlessness frightens me. But I want to hear from anyone who has, and be told definitively why it wouldn't work 100% of the time.
8 comments:
Two splendid years in a row some branch of my in-laws have done this to us. We then have to pay for postage to receive, get this, our Christmas card from them. Next year I'll know it's not a mistake. So the answer is: it stops working when the recipient stops paying for it. :P
I'm guessing this scam would only work within the same postal area. If you tried to pull that from NY to a DC address the post office would surely take notice, no?
Whoa, Cat- do you really have to pay to get it? Bizzare! I thought it would just get dumped in your mail slot with a red stamp on it. And Omar, yes- sadly, the MySpace blog is dead. Too hard to update from there, but I'm hoping this'll do it.
(I'd only be brave enough to do it in-city, too).
Btw, Ciara. What's up with the horn picture for this post? I'm sloooow so excuse me for not getting whatever it means right away :)
This was a Baltimore to West Coast delivery, and what you get is a little slip informing you that there is a letter for you at the Post Office. So then you have to go, wait in line, sign and pay for it. Revenge will be sweet....
The out-of-town thing makes sense. They're not stupid at the post office, you know. Just homicidal.
The horn was a call for answers; it didn't make a *whole* lot of sense, but it made *some* sense. To me. Kind of.
Kudos on your new web-log. From here on out, it looks like if I want juicy Simpsons quotes, I may just have to, I dunno...watch the simpsons. In regards to postage scams:
I recall trying the "ole' reverseroo" with my neighbor as a child..Worked like a dream. I obviously don't think it would work for bulk shipments. Here are some other postal "tricks" I used to play as a kid
- In middle school my friends and I used to go to the "porno rack" at the local drugstore and pull out "subscription" cards for Playboy/Hustler/Penthouse/STUDS/MANHOLE
. We would fill them out using our schoolyard enemies names and adresses, check off "I am over 18" and "Bill me upon receipt". Let's just say that Mr. and Mrs. Lifschitz were not thrilled that their little Billy was already into "BODS AND RODS- EBONY EDITION" at such an early age.
- My childhood dog, Cinnamon, is a folk-hero in our house. Despite her death in 2004 (at the of 15), she continues to haunt our mail. Growing up my sister and I would always fill out just about every conceivable "free sample", application, subscription and offer form using Cinnamon's name. My dog currently gets more mail at my parents house than my siblings or I. Nordstroms having a "guest only" shoe sale?...Cinnamon has a VIP pass in the mail. New Viagra alternative on the market? Cinnamon's got a promo pen awaiting her rigor-mortus'ed paws. How do you say "Value-Pak" in doggish? Some people waste money on pet-graves and pet funerals. In this consumerism obsessed 21st century culture, what better way to honor thy pet than to get tons of free shit in their name in the mail long after they have ceased chasing the mailman and humping the beanbag?
Thanks! I was running out of really appropriate Simpsons quotes, and besides, it was taking me longer to find them than to write the blog. Highly inappropriate. Cinnamon (rest her shaggy soul) reminds me so much of Santos L. Halper, though, that I am sorely tempted to put them back in.
Post a Comment