People selling stamps on eBay!

[anTi]

Just happened to be looking at someones feedback today when i noticed that they had bought a lot of stamps.

these are being sold as for "philatelic" use only FFS. Can't someone at royal Mail put a stop to this? You can't even buy a BB gun on eBAy but you can by stuff that's basically defrauding a company out of money.

[pokos27]

its dsa that is defrauding money from royal mail.

[Dogs of War]

If I get any mail through the door and the stamp is not franked, I peel it off.

[ihatedogs]

/

[fng]

Are these fake stamps? I've had IB on my round as a customer buying frequently off the same ebay seller was receiving her packages with fake stamps on. These were traced to a PO box in south london. I was asked to request the packaging off the customer, which she willingly gave and IB moved their investigation down south.

What can IB do about it if they are genuine but NON franked stamps ? What power do they have if an ebay seller uses these stamps (and there are THOUSANDS available on ebay....so im told )to post items and there is no way of proving they have never been used before?

If RM cant get the fundamentals right, like franking their own product, with their own machines, then that's the crime, not the guy taking advantage of RM poor performance.

Granted, there is an argument that every stamp re used is less money into RM's pot therfore putting our jobs at risk....but come on RM how hard is it to get the job right first time everytime?

As i'm sure you guys are the same, I deliver at least £20 a day of un franked mail and even the "security stamps" are easy to peel in one piece.......if you chose to !!!

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Are these fake stamps? I've had IB on my round as a customer buying frequently off the same ebay seller was receiving her packages with fake stamps on. These were traced to a PO box in south london. I was asked to request the packaging off the customer, which she willingly gave and IB moved their investigation down south.

What can IB do about it if they are genuine but NON franked stamps ? What power do they have if an ebay seller uses these stamps (and there are THOUSANDS available on ebay....so im told )to post items and there is no way of proving they have never been used before?

If RM cant get the fundamentals right, like franking their own product, with their own machines, then that's the crime, not the guy taking advantage of RM poor performance.

Granted, there is an argument that every stamp re used is less money into RM's pot therfore putting our jobs at risk....but come on RM how hard is it to get the job right first time everytime?

As i'm sure you guys are the same, I deliver at least £20 a day of un franked mail and even the "security stamps" are easy to peel in one piece.......if you chose to !!!

Yes it is a crime to reuse stamps (franked or not), stamps knowingly used again, is an offence under the Fraud Act 2006.

BTW like the irony in your post

[Lounge Lizard]

Are these fake stamps? I've had IB on my round as a customer buying frequently off the same ebay seller was receiving her packages with fake stamps on. These were traced to a PO box in south london. I was asked to request the packaging off the customer, which she willingly gave and IB moved their investigation down south.

What can IB do about it if they are genuine but NON franked stamps ? What power do they have if an ebay seller uses these stamps (and there are THOUSANDS available on ebay....so im told )to post items and there is no way of proving they have never been used before?

If RM cant get the fundamentals right, like franking their own product, with their own machines, then that's the crime, not the guy taking advantage of RM poor performance.

Granted, there is an argument that every stamp re used is less money into RM's pot therfore putting our jobs at risk....but come on RM how hard is it to get the job right first time everytime?

As i'm sure you guys are the same, I deliver at least £20 a day of un franked mail and even the "security stamps" are easy to peel in one piece.......if you chose to !!!

Yes it is a crime to reuse stamps (franked or not), stamps knowingly used again, is an offence under the Fraud Act 2006.

BTW like the irony in your post

To quote theFraud Act 2006 ;
11 Obtaining services dishonestly
(1) A person is guilty of an offence under this section if he obtains services for
himself or another—
(a) by a dishonest act, and
(b) in breach of subsection (2).
(2) A person obtains services in breach of this subsection if—
(a) they are made available on the basis that payment has been, is being or
will be made for or in respect of them,
(b) he obtains them without any payment having been made for or in
respect of them or without payment having been made in full, and
(c) when he obtains them, he knows—
(i) that they are being made available on the basis described in
paragraph (a), or
(ii) that they might be,
but intends that payment will not be made, or will not be made in full.
(3) A person guilty of an offence under this section is liable—
(a) on summary conviction, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 12
months or to a fine not exceeding the statutory maximum (or to both);
(b) on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding
5 years or to a fine (or to both)

[PhilthyPhil]

I cancel so many stamps everyday. Ever since the flats started going through the FSM instead of all being manual hardly any of them have had the stamps canceled by the MCs. There are often several £ worth of stamps left uncancelled on packets and SDs. We just cancel them all with a pen in my DO.

[chunk]

Its not unusual as tom Jones once said.
I was working in a mail center one Christmas and noticed about 50 packets come through smothered with 1972 and 1976
Olympic stamps! probably a local businessman picked up stamp albums at a car boot or auction and decided their face value was worth more.
a philatelist would be pulling his hair out! I even saw a charles and di stamp in the same batch.

[human1]

How can you peel off these new type of stamps when thay have two tamper proof things it them ???

[POSTMAN]

I'd like to think there would be no answer to the above.

[Lounge Lizard]

Its not unusual as tom Jones once said.
I was working in a mail center one Christmas and noticed about 50 packets come through smothered with 1972 and 1976
Olympic stamps! probably a local businessman picked up stamp albums at a car boot or auction and decided their face value was worth more.
a philatelist would be pulling his hair out! I even saw a charles and di stamp in the same batch.

"a philatelist would be pulling his hair out" - no, there were far, far more philatelists back then so dealers stocked up with stamps for which there is now practically no philatelic demand, hence them widely and legitimately being for sale marginally below face value.

[chunk]

Its not unusual as tom Jones once said.
I was working in a mail center one Christmas and noticed about 50 packets come through smothered with 1972 and 1976
Olympic stamps! probably a local businessman picked up stamp albums at a car boot or auction and decided their face value was worth more.
a philatelist would be pulling his hair out! I even saw a charles and di stamp in the same batch.

"a philatelist would be pulling his hair out" - no, there were far, far more philatelists back then so dealers stocked up with stamps for which there is now practically no philatelic demand, hence them widely and legitimately being for sale marginally below face value.

I get what your saying and i dont imagine (1976 Olympic stamps) for example have huge value!
I was more amused by the irony that someone carefully using time and patience assembled these sets and preserved their "mintness".....
did i just coin a word the spell checker doesnt like it!..... only to have them reclaimed for face value certainly ironic.

[fng]

To quote theFraud Act 2006 ;
11 Obtaining services dishonestly
(1) A person is guilty of an offence under this section if he obtains services for
himself or another—
(a) by a dishonest act, and
(b) in breach of subsection (2).
(2) A person obtains services in breach of this subsection if—
(a) they are made available on the basis that payment has been, is being or
will be made for or in respect of them,
(b) he obtains them without any payment having been made for or in
respect of them or without payment having been made in full, and
(c) when he obtains them, he knows—
(i) that they are being made available on the basis described in
paragraph (a), or
(ii) that they might be,
but intends that payment will not be made, or will not be made in full.
(3) A person guilty of an offence under this section is liable—
(a) on summary conviction, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 12
months or to a fine not exceeding the statutory maximum (or to both);
(b) on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding
5 years or to a fine (or to both)
[/quote]

Thats all well and good but what about the stamps that have no franks on..... the only regulation as i see it, is that a stamp is to franked when it is used and that is the only way of proving a stamp has been used for postage and not just put on a letter by mistake and then reapplied to the correct letter ...for example. The guys doing the fraud, know its fraud but they are not about to hand themselves in, so its down to IB / Police to get evidence and the only evidence is a frank - no frank no proof.

[Lounge Lizard]

To quote theFraud Act 2006 ;
11 Obtaining services dishonestly
(1) A person is guilty of an offence under this section if he obtains services for
himself or another—
(a) by a dishonest act, and
(b) in breach of subsection (2).
(2) A person obtains services in breach of this subsection if—
(a) they are made available on the basis that payment has been, is being or
will be made for or in respect of them,
(b) he obtains them without any payment having been made for or in
respect of them or without payment having been made in full, and
(c) when he obtains them, he knows—
(i) that they are being made available on the basis described in
paragraph (a), or
(ii) that they might be,
but intends that payment will not be made, or will not be made in full.
(3) A person guilty of an offence under this section is liable—
(a) on summary conviction, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 12
months or to a fine not exceeding the statutory maximum (or to both);
(b) on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding
5 years or to a fine (or to both)

Thats all well and good but what about the stamps that have no franks on..... the only regulation as i see it, is that a stamp is to franked when it is used and that is the only way of proving a stamp has been used for postage and not just put on a letter by mistake and then reapplied to the correct letter ...for example. The guys doing the fraud, know its fraud but they are not about to hand themselves in, so its down to IB / Police to get evidence and the only evidence is a frank - no frank no proof.[/quote]


As I understand it, someone who reuses a stamp that has already been used as a means of paying postage, whether it has been cancelled or not, is obtaining services dishonestly, a dishonest act under the Fraud Act ( and subject to 12 months imprisonment, but the Police have more important matters to deal with at present ). I agree with you if your point is that this could not be readily proved if it had not previously been cancelled. Uncancelled stamps cut from envelopes are for sale on ebay and if these are glued to envelopes, being more difficult to peel off with the recent security cuts in them, then Royal Mail's assumption might be that they had been reused, but that is not necessarily the case.