[Alexandria Radio Club Reflector] FW: [Dx-qsl] Follow Operator Instructions on QRZ.com

[Ian]

Good advice from Fred K3ZO...

-----Original Message-----
From: dx-qsl-bounces at mailman.qth.net [mailto:dx-qsl-bounces at mailman.qth.net]
On Behalf Of Alfred Laun
Sent: Wednesday, September 18, 2013 9:36 PM
To: dx-qsl
Subject: [Dx-qsl] Follow Operator Instructions on QRZ.com

Ladies & Gentlemen:

Each month our Bureau receives hundreds of cards for rare DX stations and
DXpeditions who, on their own QRZ.com pages, state that they will not answer
bureau cards.

We recognize that one reason people use the bureau is that they don't have
to check QRZ.com or another online lookup service before sending off the
card.  This is directed at those of you who see what their QRZ.com page says
about QSL policies and send off cards to the bureau anyway.  This causes us
many hours of extra work per month to re-direct the cards to the real
managers or to the station's own bureau, and even after our efforts almost
all of these cards will not be answered anyway.

So a word to the wise:  If an operator says he/she will not answer bureau
cards, he/she in all likelihood means it.   That means that there is no
cheap way to get around the instructions.  While we may lament the fact that
$$$ have become such a big factor in DXing these days, we as a bureau are
not in a position to do anything about it.

By the way, a number of operators, some of whom make a lot of QSOs, have
told us they do not wish to receive bureau QSLs.  We list their calls on our
web page, http://www.ncdxa.org/qsl.shtml

Some bureaus, notably the DARC, return unwanted cards to the senders, but
for us to do so would mean that this is being subsidized by the ARRL members
who use the ARRL outgoing QSL service, possibly causing their rates
eventually to be raised.  We don't want to do that to our fellow ARRL
members, so the best we can do is make an effort to publicize the calls of
the DXers who do not accept bureau cards.  Instead, we send most of the
unwanted cards to K8CX for use on his wonderful web page Hamgallery.com, and
some others have been provided to elementary school teachers  who use them
in their geography classes.

73 & DX,

Fred Laun, K3ZO
Manager
NCDXA/ARRL Third Call Area Incoming QSL Bureau