[Dx-qsl] changes - again - to IRC handling by USPS

[Patrick STODDARD]

Hello!

At the end of last year, the US Postal Service changed the rules to 
where they would only accept the small pre-2002 IRCs if they were 
purchased from a US post office and had not been exchanged for stamps 
(exchanged at 1 cent below IRC's original sale price).  Pre-2002 IRCs 
from outside the US were worthless at a US post office, and any of the 
"expires 31 December 2006" IRCs were also worthless.  Things are changing
again...

US Postal Service Bulletin 22215, on 13 September 2007, had these
items related to IRCs:

First of all, the US-issued pre-2002 (small) IRCs will only be 
exchanged for stamps at a US post office until 11 October 2007.
After that date, they become worthless for postage in the US 
just like all of the small non-US IRCs.  

One thing that I did not realize from the bulletins last year is 
that US-issued IRCs that expired on 31 December 2006 *still* have 
value at a US post office!  They do, until 1 September 2008, 
at 1 cent below the original sale price.

After 1 September 2008, the only IRCs that a US post office will
redeem for stamps will be one that expires on 31 December 2009.
All other IRCs will be worthless at a US post office.  The current
IRCs are redeemable for either 90 cents in stamps (if the IRC is
from a non-US post office, not already postmarked on the right 
side) or one cent below the original sale price (if the IRC is 
from a US post office, also not postmarked on the right side).  

The complete bulletin is available at:

http://www.usps.com/cpim/ftp/bulletin/2007/pb22215.pdf

See pages 28 and 57 for the sections related to IRCs.  Or, if you
only want to get those two pages downloaded to print out (in case
you want to redeem some of these old US IRCs), I have PDFs of these
two pages at:

http://www.geocities.com/xe2wd9ewk/irc/

(this is on free Geocities web space, so hourly bandwidth limits are
enforced - e-mail me directly if you have difficulties getting those
two PDFs, or just want to get them directly to your e-mail account)

Again, if you're on the hunt to get rid of some old - or really old -
US IRCs, good luck!  As we all know, not all postal clerks know the
process, even when we present it to them.  :-)  Have a great weekend,
and 73!



Patrick WD9EWK/VA7EWK 
http://www.wd9ewk.net/