Stamps row with Royal Mail as recipients charged for festive cards

ROYAL MAIL has been embroiled in a row over postage costs after some recipients of Christmas cards were asked to pay where outdated and “counterfeit” stamps were used.

Several Daily Telegraph readers have disclosed they were made to pay to receive their greeting cards, some of which were undelivered because of insufficient postage.

The majority of stamps without barcodes have not been valid since July 31, following a six-month extension after the introduction of new digital stamps. Writing in yesterday’s Daily Telegraph letters page, Tim Horne said he was charged £2.50 to receive a card sent by a friend to his wife because the sender had used an old stamp.

Stephen Ennis said he had paid £5 for an undelivered item with insufficient postage, which turned out to be a Christmas card. He said that the stamp did bear a barcode but it had been labelled “counterfeit”. On contacting the sender, he discovered the alleged fake stamps were purchased from a post office. Under close inspection, he said, the newer stamp had a slightly different barcode.

Alan Green said he was also required to pay £5 when he received a card from an old friend which had a stamp that had been marked as counterfeit. He said: “I fail to see how any penalty can be more than the cost of another firstclass stamp as I am not the culprit.”

Mainstream retailers have been accused of continuing to sell the old stamps, which cannot be used in the

‘I fail to see how any postage penalty can be more than the cost of another first-class stamp’

UK. Older Christmas stamps, or other special stamps with pictures on, can still be used.

Lee Smith claimed that a store in Cardiff had given him a pack of eight firstclass stamps that were marked not to be used after December 2021 while stamps bearing the profile of the late Queen Elizabeth, and do not have barcodes, appeared to be for sale online on sites including Amazon.

Customers with old stamps can still swap them for new barcoded stamps, by filling out a form and posting them to “Freepost Swap Out”. However, some people claimed they had struggled to have their old stamps replaced.

George Icke said that he had sent off his stamps to be replaced but had received a letter from Royal Mail telling him that he had been sold counterfeits.

The cost of a book of first-class stamps hit £10 for the first time in September. A single first-class stamp rose to £1.25.

A Royal Mail spokesman said it was “vital” any cases where a person believes stamps have been incorrectly flagged as counterfeit are investigated. “To do this, we require any customer who believes they have been incorrectly surcharged to send the envelope, with the barcoded stamp attached, to us, with the exact location of where the stamp was purchased,” he said.