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Christmas cards or emails?

christmas-cards-emails — The world over, the mail must get through – image by Brazilian photographer Alexandre Fukugava www.pixabay.com

Last week I posted a handful of Christmas cards to New Zealand. The woman in the post office frowned and said I’d missed the deadline for international post.

“But it’s only New Zealand, so they will probably get there,” she added, with a slow, small country town smile.

I’m not so confident. The record time taken for mail exchanged between my sister and I was 17 days in 2020. Blimey, I could have flown over and hand-delivered it, enjoying a two-week holiday at the same time.

Those of you with family members living abroad know of the annual dilemma. Is it Christmas cards in the post and/or calendars, an animated ecard or an email with a word document of the family’s highlights through the year?

The problem with the annual epistle is that some years are just crap. Nothing good happened and you didn’t go anywhere, right?

I have more or less faithfully kept up the tradition of sending cards in the mail, not expecting one in return, since moving to Australia in the mid-1970s (stamps then cost 10c).

When we were both working, we’d shop for Australian calendars and post them to relatives in New Zealand, Canada and the UK. We stopped doing this once the cost of postage became more than the cost of the calendars.

Last month, I had a reminder email from animated ecard producer Jacquie Lawson, who offers cards for all occasions. The reminder was that my $20 subscription was about to lapse. It was a shock to find I had sent only five ecards in 12 months. I must be old school after all.

I’m not renewing, but if you decide (on December 23, after counting the unsolicited cards on the tree and mantel piece), that you should reciprocate, it’s easy to sign up and deliver an impressive ecard.

The first Christmas card was issued in 1843 by UK civil servant, inventor and entrepreneur Henry Cole, the first director of the Victoria and Albert Museum. Cole was instrumental in reforming the British postal system, helping to set up the Uniform Penny Post. This system encouraged the sending of seasonal greetings on decorated letterheads and visiting cards. Struck by the idea of creating a greeting card of his own, Henry asked his friend, artist John Callcott Horsley, to illustrate it.

Horsley’s design depicts the Cole family raising a toast in a central, hand-coloured panel surrounded by a decorative trellis and black and white scenes depicting acts of giving.

Cole commissioned a printer to transfer the design onto cards, printing a thousand copies that could be personalised with a hand-written greeting. The issue (at a shilling each), was described as a commercial failure.

Cole would have been fascinated to see how his idea blossomed into a multi-billion-dollar business. The greetings card industry is in a spot of trouble now, as digital options make sending greetings cheaper and faster.

Marketing group researchandmarkets.com released projections that showed global greetings card sales would drop 17% from $23 billion in 2020 to $20.9 billion in 2026. Reasons for the decline include the popularity of social media platforms and messaging apps such as WhatsApp.

“Despite the challenges posed by the growing social media and e-cards, there still exists a niche consumer base for physical greeting cards,” a spokesman said.

“Giving and receiving these cards continues to matter to a set of consumers, albeit a shrinking one. For this niche group of consumers, a physical greeting card on special occasions means much more than a Facebook message or an e-card.”

Last year, the Australia Post network delivered around one million fewer letters every working day than prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020.

A spokesman told FOMM the network did not differentiate between Christmas mail and regular letters so could not produce meaningful statistics. But as a guide, the annual Santa Mail program last year received more than 118,000 letters bound for the North Pole!

Australia Post is one of Australia’s most successful companies, posting revenue of $8.3 billion for 2021 and pre-tax profit of $100.7 million.

“This is a strong result, with our domestic parcels business continuing to go from strength to strength, while we retained our position as a market leader with parcel and services revenue growth of 17.7%,” acting CEO Rodney Boys said in the 2021 annual report.

Revenue was driven by a record peak period, with more than 52 million parcels delivered in December alone. The organisation is continually finding new ways to take advantage of the growth in ecommerce (more than one million households now shop on-line each month). Australia Post has developed well beyond a simple service for mail delivery. The network supports banking and bill-paying services for major institutions.

My recent application to renew my Australian passport (at the post office), for example, cost $307.00 plus $27.95 for passport photos, taken by Australia Post.

(Ed: He has some spares if you’d like an autographed one).

The Australian Passport Office delivered my new passport by registered mail ($4.45) in just under four weeks so obviously the Passport Office/Australia Post collaboration is working well.

The strong growth in ecommerce and parcel home delivery has coincided with an ongoing decline in the volume of letters, however. Revenue dropped from $2.33 billion in 2017 to $1.77 billion in 2021.

As a trustee of a self managed super fund, I can vouch that all companies which issue shares promote electronic delivery of annual reports and other correspondence. All of the institutions and government agencies with which we have dealings also push hard to convert their clients to on-line interaction.

Despite my earlier observation about the time taken for mail to arrive in New Zealand, Australia Post boasts a 94% delivered on time record for letters and parcels. If the letter/parcel you are expecting is late, it is probably someone else’s fault.

There are 7,950 postal routes in Australia, some requiring a marathon effort to traverse. We should be grateful for the 10,000 ‘Posties’ who battle rain, hail, bushfire smoke, steaming hot days and aggressive dogs.

No laughing matter that, with Australia Post confirming that more than 1,000 posties have been attacked by household dogs in the past six months. Nibbler used to bark at the postie, or more accurately at the scooter as it whizzed past. I went out one day to introduce the dog, thinking it would make him less likely to bark and run along the fence. Our local postman said it was ‘traditional’ for dogs to bark at posties.

I hope this has inspired you to get out your address book and start writing in cards (buy a box of cards from a charity and do two good deeds in one).

A study by the University of Limerick concluded that the act of sending (and receiving) Christmas cards can help alleviate depression. Moreover, if someone who always sends you a card suddenly doesn’t, this can be a red flag.

“If you do not hear from someone who regularly sends you a Christmas card, it might be worth checking in with them to spread some Christmas cheer,” said Dr Jennifer McMahon, a lecturer in psychology at UL and study co-author.

You have seven days.

Postscript: I wrote an irony-laden Christmas song which has been described as ‘a bit dark’ by someone who saw a preview. Not suitable for children.

Wait a minute Mr Postman

So goes the refrain of a much-covered song from a now-defunct genre of love songs involving ‘snail mail’. Well may they call it that, with packages mailed to my sister in New Zealand taking up to 12 days to arrive. A Leunig calendar mailed to a friend in London in early December still has not arrived!

I’ve been hanging out every day for the Postie to arrive. What’s got me on Postie-alert is a series of online purchases, all of which offered free delivery via Australia Post. So far, the items have arrived on time (as alerted by text), although the first parcel took eight days to get here (including a weekend and a public holiday).

You may have noticed I had a month off social media and re-introduced myself with a selfie posting a letter (above). Not terribly original and a bit out of focus but it got some attention. What I didn’t say was the letter being posted was a return-to-sender; a marketing letter to a person who no longer lives here.

My most recent experience of return-to-sender was the return of a Christmas card to someone who moved and didn’t let me know. Several weeks elapsed between the posting and the return. I found that person’s email address and sent an electronic card, which I probably should have done in the first place.

When was the last time you got a personal, hand-written letter in the mail? People do still write letters, but by and large, personal communications have been overtaken by SMS, Messenger, email and PMS (private messages) on social media.

In the heyday of the US Postal service, hundreds of pop songs were written, exploiting the emotions engendered by (a) receiving a love letter or (b) conversely waiting for a letter which probably isn’t going to arrive.

There is no limit to the mawkishness of sentiments expressed in letter songs, as exemplified in Bill Carlisle’s 1938 tune No Letter in the Mail Today, covered by Roy Acuff, Bill Monroe, the Stanley Brothers and others.

No answer to my love letter

To sooth my achin’ heart

Why did God ever permit

True love like ours to part

The last verse goes quite close to the man saying that if he does not get a letter he will end it all. My music historian pal Franky’s Dad (aka Lyn Nuttall), put together this Spotify playlist ,which includes three versions of Please, Mr. Postman, a number one hit for the Motown group the Marvelettes.

Wait Mister Postman

Oh yeah

(Is there a letter in your bag for me?) Please, Please Mister Postman

(Why’s it been a very long time) Oh yeah

(Since I heard from this boyfriend of mine)

There has been speculation by reviewers and music historians that the song is a not-so subtle commentary on the Vietnam War.

There must be some word today

From my boyfriend so far away

Please, Mister Postman, look and see

Is there a letter, a letter for me?

Source: lyricfind

Many of you may recall that angst-ridden time when you broke up with someone and then regretted it. So you wrote a letter, didn’t you, and fruitlessly waited for a reply.

Elvis Presley had a massive hit with that earworm of a song, Return to Sender. The man writes to his estranged love and instead of reading the letter, she writes upon it, “Return to sender, address unknown, no such number, no such zone.”

Our romantic protagonist persists, as romantics do, sending it again by special delivery and even hand-delivered. But the letter keeps coming back (to that circular chorus – “she wrote upon it…”).

Writers Otis Blackwell (who also wrote Great Balls of Fire) and Winfield Scott were not to know the US Postal Service would change its delivery system of zones to zip codes the following year, making the lyric redundant. Not that anyone cared – Return to Sender went Platinum in the US (one million copies sold) and was used in the soundtrack of Girls, Girls, Girls in 1962. Songfacts.com, my go-to source when writing about hit records, notes that this song led to the US Postal Service issuing a commemorative Elvis stamp in 1993, marking what would have been The King’s 58^th birthday.

“Enterprising stamp collectors put Elvis stamps on letters that day and mailed them off with false addresses so they would be sent back marked “Return To Sender” and become collector’s items.”

Motown group The Boxtops had a hit with ‘The Letter’, a song which is the polar opposite of Please, Mr. Postman and Return to Sender. In ‘The Letter’, the man gets a letter (‘my baby she wrote me a letter’) and drops everything, saying ‘gimme a ticket for an aeroplane…’.

The song was famously re-invented by Joe Cocker in his Mad Dogs and Englishmen phase, relishing the song’s evocative, if ungrammatical bridge:

Well, she wrote me a letter

Said she couldn’t live without me no more

Listen mister, can’t you see I got to get back

To my baby once-a more

Anyway, yeah.

More recently Australian lyricist Nick Cave penned ‘Love letter’, kissing the seal on a letter and sending it off, having regretted something he said: “Love letter, love letter, go get her, go get her.”

Getting back to the headline, The Marvelettes, four young black women whose publicity photos of the day has them sporting beehive hairdos, first recorded Please, Mr. Postman in 1961.

It was a No 1 hit in the US, followed two years later by The Beatles. A dozen years on, The Carpenters came up with their own version of the song written by Georgia Dobbins, William Garrett, Freddie Gorman, Brian Holland, and Robert Bateman.

There are many lists of songs which mention posties, the postal service or letters, though for obvious reasons Tom Waits’s classic ‘Christmas Card From a Hooker in Minneapolis’ does not make the cut.

The ones I discussed must have rung my adolescent bell in the 1960s. Tunes like Stevie Wonder’s 1970 ballad, ‘Signed, Sealed, Delivered (I’m yours)’, passed me by, probably coinciding with my skiffle and jug band music phase. No, I do not have the duffle coat. (I threw it out when it had more holes than cloth. Ed)

Apart from ‘dead letters’ (undeliverable items), mail sometimes goes astray because of theft or hoarding by postal employees. Recently, a 61-year-old Japanese postal worker was referred to prosecutors after investigators found some 24,000 undelivered items dating back to 2003. The Guardian Weekly’s Global Report item said the postie told police it was ‘too much bother’ to deliver the mail.

Theft by mail employees is not uncommon in the US, where billions of items are delivered every year. The US Postal Service investigated 1,364 suspected employee mail theft cases and arrested 409 employees between October 2016 and September 2017.

Incidents of postal employee stealing or hoarding mail are less common in Australia, but authorities have reported an increase in ‘porch theft’ – persons unknown stealing parcels after they have been delivered.

If you did not know, Australia Post has a service where you can collect parcels from your local post office or have them re-directed if you are not going to be home.

As I discovered with my online parcel deliveries, I received a text offering two choices: 1/ someone will be home or 2/ pick up from the post office.

Given that Australia Post delivers $4.8 billion worth of parcels a year, that’s smart use of technology.

Further reading: https://bobwords.com.au/cancel-po-box/

ATM fees abolition a smoke screen?

If you were feeling all warm and fuzzy about the Big Four banks deciding to drop the hated ‘foreign’ ATM fees, sorry, the feeling won’t last. For a start, the Commonwealth Bank’s decision to go first didn’t last long. The CBA announced the fee abolition early on Sunday (aiming for a slow news day lead). But within hours, Westpac, the ANZ and National Bank of Australia had all suddenly (on a Sunday) released statements that they had come to the same point of view. The likely reason is that the boards of all four banks (and others) have had the ATM fees item on their agendas for a while now, just waiting for the right time to tell their media people to press “go”.

And they make it sound like they’re doing us all a big favour. Banks have been gouging ATM fees (typically $2 or $2.50) since the Reserve Bank of Australia first said they could, in March 2009. The main ‘victims’ of this unjust fee (for using an ATM owned by another bank), were the people who travel interstate or intrastate and had no choice.

RBA data tells us there were 251.65 million ‘foreign’ ATM withdrawals in the last financial year. Deutsche Bank estimates the Big Four have foregone about $117 million by dropping the ATM fee, according to the Australian Financial Review. But that’s a modest amount compared to the $4.4 billion we collectively pay out in bank fees every year.

RateCity analysis of RBA data shows the average mortgage holder paid $471 on banking fees last year. That includes $240 a year in home loan fees and $231 in credit card fees.

In this context as some have suggested, the ATM fees abolition story is a PR smoke screen. ABC senior business correspondent Peter Ryan said of Sunday’s news coup…“the planned, if not co-ordinated, decision is mostly about banks doing what it takes to avoid a royal commission into bad banking behaviour.”

The most recent media disclosures about money laundering allegations compound other image issues for banks, including financial advice scandals and allegations of market manipulation and misleading conduct.

While the big bank PR people might be spinning this as “listening to our consumers”, the real story is ATMs are becoming less popular.

Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) data shows ATM use is falling and falling sharply. Monthly withdrawal transactions have fallen from a high of 78.427 million in December 2008 to 48.684 million in January 2017.

Banking analysts ascribe this sharp downturn in ATM use to the now ubiquitous “tap” method of paying for anything from a Mars bar to a week’s worth of groceries. There is also the “any cash out?” query whenever you spend money in a supermarket or bottle shop.

Pat McConnell, Visiting Fellow, Macquarie University Applied Finance Centre, says new technologies will soon be launched that further undermine ATMs. The biggest will be the New Payments Platform (NPP). Another is OSKO, a new payment mechanism from the developers of BPAY.

McConnell writing for The Conversation, says the NPP will change the way that payments are made in Australia.

“Rather than putting a payment on a credit card or waiting a few days for a payment from another bank to clear, with NPP payments will be cleared in a few minutes or less. Using NPP, anyone will be able to make an almost instantaneous transfer of funds into the bank of a supplier, such as a plumber.”

As McConnell puts it, with NPP, everyone with a smartphone and spare cash is an ATM.

Technology changes go some way to explaining why so many bank branches are closing or relocating to kiosk-style retail outlets. Last week, for the first time, I withdrew cash from an ATM outside the local Bank of Queensland branch. I did so because the Suncorp branch in Maleny closed in mid-September and with it went the Suncorp ATM. Suncorp’s advice was to use (a) the BOQ-branded ATM across the road or (b) withdraw cash at the Post Office. Transaction duly completed, I was pleased/relieved to find that I was not charged a fee for using the other provider’s ATM.

(Incidentally, Suncorp announced on Tuesday it would scrap ‘foreign’ fees on its 400 ATMs Australia-wide by the end of December).

There are still six ATMs in Maleny, although the jury is out as to which won’t charge a fee if you bank with someone else.

In case you didn’t know, some ATMs (the ones found in pubs, casinos, convenience stores, roadhouses and other retail outlets) may charge you a fee regardless. What the Big Bank decision to scrap ATM fees means for their business model remains to be seen.

Maleny has just two banks left (Bank of Queensland and Maleny Credit Union (now called MCU Ltd). The ANZ left its ATM in place and established a mobile business bank at the other end of the street.

Since 2007, the number of bank branches in Australia has dropped from 6,600 in 2007 to fewer than 5,600. Branch closures are ongoing, with the Finance Sector Union recently revealing Westpac branch closures in Western Australia and Victoria.

When our local Suncorp branch closed, we went in to check out rumours of cake. Yes, there was (gluten-free) cake, iced in Suncorp colours.

We popped in to say “bye”, but ironically tellers were too pre-occupied serving customers for other than a quick “thanks and good luck”.

What’s bothering me more, honestly, is my habit of collecting gold coins in a container and, once I have $100 or so, banking the cash in my account. Oh, you do that too? The gals at Suncorp didn’t have a problem with this old-school habit. We were told (by Suncorp) we could do basic banking business at the local Australia Post branch. I queued up yesterday, banked $30 in gold coins and it was no drama at all. I even got a receipt.

Now, about that late fee for missing a credit card payment by one day…

Cancel my PO Box

Some of my rural readers have been writing impassioned letters about a troubling domestic issue (the rising cost of renting a PO Box).

“Dear Mr BobWords, (wrote Perplexed Pensioner of Reeseville)

“When we knew we’d be moving to Maleny, we applied for a PO Box. “When we arrived here on Dec 22nd, 1993, the post office was still in the old house on the corner of Teak St.

“They kept saying (once we presented ourselves in person), that there were no private mailboxes to spare, so we had “poste restante” status for quite a while. Once the new Riverside Centre post office opened, we were finally able to rent our new PO Box: the fee was $40 p.a. (1995-96).

“When I recently received the renewal notice for my standard P.O Box, I could see it was going to cost me $129. Frankly, it seemed a waste of a Pensioner’s Pittance. Australia Post offered a $5 discount if you paid before March 31^st (but nothing for pensioners!)

“So, after almost 24 years I have let go of my town lifeline.”

Yes, we hear you, Perplexed Pensioner. We decided there was not enough mail arriving in our private mailbox to justify the expense.

Ironically, when we inquired about getting a six-month mail redirection, we found that these rates too would rise on April 3.

When reviewing essential household mail, I discovered that 80% of our bills and official communiques arrive via email.

In line with similar issues facing postal services in all countries, revenue has been squeezed by online transaction services. Moreover, operating costs in this labour-intensive business (Oz Post employs 36,000 people), keep on rising.

As always, Australia Post is constrained by its obligation to offer postal services to all, no matter where they live.

Next time you gasp at the cost of posting a letter or parcel, Australia Post’s 2016 annual report confirms that losses for its regulated postal service over five years now total $1.29 billion.

Increasing the cost of letter postage from 41c in 1989 to $1 in 2017 does not seem to have done the trick.

Nevertheless, Australia Post returned a profit after tax every year between 2012 and 2014. Though producing its first after-tax loss of $221.7M in 2015, it was in the black again last year ($36.4 million).

Email rules – for now

If I had to mail this newsletter to FOMM subscribers, it would cost more than $500 per week, including envelopes, stamps, printing and labour. That would mean I’d have to pass the cost on to you, dear reader, market forces driving me to embrace the profit ethos.

Australia Post’s letter volumes peaked in 2008, according to its 2016 annual report. In the eight years since, volumes have declined by 41% per letterbox. We have seen this happen in our private mail box too.

Perplexed Pensioner referred us to a blog by Anny, a calendar-maker. She took Australia Post to task in 2014 and again this year for what she sees as price gouging, including a list of PO Box price rises compiled from her records of invoices (from $55 in 2004 to $129 in 2017).

While price increases in recent years have been well above average annual inflation, increases have been smaller since 2014.

“From February, Post Office (PO) Box prices increased by an average of 2.7% across the product range,” an Australia Post spokesperson told FOMM. “Like many businesses, Australia Post is operating in a challenging economic environment with increasing costs and competition.”

Local correspondent Little Bird says the cost of private mail boxes is a can of worms for the minority of Australians who do not have street delivery.

“Because we don’t have street delivery we pay a discounted rate, but I think it’s still a bit rich when everyone else gets their mail delivered for nothing.

“Also, since we live out of town it also means they won’t deliver parcels out here. The Australia Post-aligned couriers won’t deliver here either. (There are some which contract to Australia Post and some which do their own deliveries). So the sender pays a courier rate to have something delivered and it still goes no further than the PO Box.”

Australia Post responded: “Residents living in areas that receive a street delivery service less than once per week can collect mail over the Post Office counter for free. As PO Boxes are an optional delivery service (they), may be eligible to lease a PO Box at a reduced rate.”

Hefty price increases are not uncommon after government-owned essential services are corporatised or privatised.

So let’s be clear about one thing – Australia Post is still 100% owned by the Commonwealth Government. However, since 1989 (when, incidentally, a stamp cost 41c), it has been run as a Government-Owned Corporation.

It is run very much along private company lines – many of its post office shops are privately owned and along the way Australia Post bought its own courier service (StarTrack) to compete with rival courier services.

The Institute of Public Affairs has lobbied for the government to fully privatise Australia Post and found supporters in the Productivity Commission and the Australian competition watchdog (the ACCC).

There are examples aplenty of countries which have done so. Britain privatised the Royal Mail in 2013. Japan Post, which became a government-owned corporation in 2003, was privatised in 2007 and listed on the stock exchange in 2016. Deutsche Post was privatised in 2000.

Australia Post was ranked fourth in a survey of the world’s best postal services, interestingly led by the government-owned and operated US Postal Service

While Australia Post competes with the digital world by offering an array of electronic services, most people just want to post a letter, card or parcel to someone and trust it will arrive within the week.

So while we have cancelled our private mailbox, we can still rely on the humble postie delivering to our letter box. They deserve a medal, going out in all weathers, dodging swooping magpies, skateboarders and hostile dogs. We were given updated figures that show there are 11,000 ‘posties’ servicing 11, 240 postal routes around Australia. Motorcycles are used for delivery on about 6,000 routes, bicycles on 900 routes and about 900 intrepid posties walk their routes, all delivering to 11.6 million locations.

On a round-Australia trip in 2015, we encountered a group of 40 men and women riding 110cc ex-‘postie’ bikes from Brisbane to Adelaide via Birdsville and remote desert roads. Members of the group paid about $5,000 each for the privilege. The cost included an ex-‘postie’ bike, all accommodation and support while en-route and a flight home. Riders were encouraged to donate their bikes to Rotary at the end of the ride.

This seems a worthier use of energy than complaining (futilely) about Australia Post and its ongoing quest for profit. You could instead enjoy a vicarious few weeks experiencing much what it must feel like to be an all-weather ‘postie’. You could send postcards to your friends from every destination (at $1 a time), confident in Australia Post’s claim that it delivers 96.2% of domestic mail on time.