Question re: political junk mail.

[Gabi Hayes]

If you get flyers: not envelopes, if you put them in the mailbox with 'return to sender' on them, do they have to pay the return postage, or is it just a bad deal for the mailman?

I SO want to start returning all the repug crap I get (I've gotten ZERO dem solicitations!), and make them pay for it

anybody know what to do about this?

I've read the threads WRT prepaid envelope enclosures where you can load them up with heavy stuff, etc, but I've never gotten any of those

thx

[DaveinMD]

1. as a direct mail consultant

I say there is no such thing as political junk mail :-) Though I do voter contact mail, not fundraising.

[Gabi Hayes]

2. OK, then. If I send a voter contact mailing back to the place of origin,

who pays for that trip?

does anybody?

if they don't have to pay for it, I won't send it, cause I don't want to make the mailman's job any worse than it already is.

I drop it off at the PO, but somebody still has to deliver it the other way.

thx

PS, if it comes from pugs, it's not junk, it's TOXIC WASTE

[DaveinMD]

3. If its a fundraising mailier

there is usually a reply envelope with first class postage affixed. You could send that back and they'd have to pay for it. Most other mail is standard and it wouldn't be delivered.

[Gabi Hayes]

4. so you're saying a flyer addressed to me, which I send back, would

just be tossed in the garbage?

if that's the case, maybe I'll just gather them all up and dump them in the local Kirk HQ

let them get a dose of what they give me every day

every DAY!

[DaveinMD]

5. if you marked it return to sender

the post office would toss it unless it says return service requested by the return address. That is unless it was mailed first class.

[G Hawes]

6. As DaveinMD said above...

use the return mail envelopes and stuff them with whatever you like (or even send them back empty) and that makes the initial sender have to pay for them.

I do this all the time with junk mail. I'll take one junk mail sender's crap and stuff it into the return envelope of another junk mail sender's crap and vice versa, or I'll stuff some other junk mail advertisement into the return envelope, or I'll just seal the return envelope and send it back empty. In all cases, the original junkmail sender has to pay for it.

Silly? Perhaps. But I figure that if they're going to send me crap, I'll make them pay for it and also engage their resources in opening up the return mail that I send back which is full of junk mail, just like theirs. It takes me all of five seconds at the mailbox, so it's worth it.

:D

[MannyGoldstein]

7. Here's What I Do

If they have a return envelope with pre-paid postage code on it, I tape the envelope to a brick and put it in the mailbox.

I'm not sure if they actually end up making it to Rethug HQ, and if they get charged for 5 pounds or so of brick being transported by the good 'ol USPS, but it just feels so right.