Letter goes on four-year trip around the world

[TrueBlueTerrier]

http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/north-ea ... -20830632/

Apr 28 2008 by Lisa Hutchinson, Evening Chronicle

BAFFLED mailroom staff are licked over a letter they sent out over four years ago which has just been returned after going on a mammoth global route.

Maureen Lenaghan and her staff sent out the letter from Newcastle University on December 3, 2003, to a student at the University of Leicester.

The A4-sized envelope was put through the franking machine and posted to Miss Chong in the communications department there.

But on its arrival, it appears the student had moved on and the mail was redirected to an address in Tsuen Wan in Hong Kong.

From there the package was then sent to the Falkland Islands, off the coast of Argentina, in the south Atlantic Ocean, before being returned to the North East, along with a sticker from the Royal Mail, dated April 22, 2008, saying the letter had not been delivered to the correct person because the address was incomplete.

Now the letter is back in the hands of Maureen and partner Chris Taylor, 61, who also works in the mail department.

Today mail supervisor Maureen, 52, who has worked in the department for 37 years, said: “This letter was posted out in December 2003 to a girl at the University of Leicester.

“It was a notification for a membership subscription which was due. But that was redirected to Hong Kong, then, for some reason, over to the Falkland Islands before being returned to us.

“It has travelled thousands of miles around the world and, I suspect, it has been in the system somewhere for over four years.â€

[Thorby Bislam]

A spokeswoman for the Royal Mail said: “It is very unlikely that this item has been in our system for any length of time as all machinery and buildings are checked regularly

It sounds likely to me. In our office we regularly get letters addressed to a town with the same name in Canada. Some are from other countries that have been missorted at their point of origin.