Guerrilla tactics for the peeved recipient
It's happening to us all. We are bombarded with rubbish. How many letters or items posted through your door do you actually want?
Amoungst the more useful stuff I get regularly are things like free papers, Pizza menus, curry menus, chinese food menus (don't get me wrong I don't want this stuff it just may come in useful one day). I also get a lot of adverts for things, credit cards, home loans, blinds, estate agents. I even get some stuff posted that you are meant to give back! They post their crappy catalogue showing the full range of DIY tools you can buy through your door then come to collect it a few days later. By which time you have of course binned it as the rubbish that it is. You then have to explain to them why you are not going to give them £1.50 to pay for it.
"You put it through my letter box it becomes mine, if I throw my property away that's my business. No, putting £1.50 on the catalogue doesn't mean I have to pay you. In fact you want me to keep it I should charge you rent. It might be a catalogue to you but to me it's just more crap that I have to throw out. Now off with you before I unleash the hounds".
Have these people never heard of deforestation? What about keep Britain tidy? What about don't drop your crap through my letter box without me actually asking for it? If I want to buy DIY tools I will go to a DIY shop, If I want a credit card I will look at the available ones and choose one that way. Pissing me off is not the way to gain my custom.
I have to dispose of loads of this stuff. Some of it like credit card applications come partially filled in with my details (these I have to shred), some is just wordy crap.
A while back some one mentioned a method to fight back. A lot of these companies include a postage paid return envelope. It was suggested that you can remove all your details from the form then post it back to them. This has the advantage of getting rid of the junk mail and returning it to the originator. Poetic huh? What is even more beautiful is that they have been charged for the postage on the envelope that you have used to return their unasked for rubbish to them.
Perhaps if they get enough back this way they will consider another way of reaching people? Or at least it will be massively inconvienient to them (there is always a bright side).
I couldn't possibly say I condone responding as above, after all what have these companies done to us?
Well, they have bombarded us with a large amount of unasked for junk mail. I guess this is bad for the environment as it mostly goes straight in the bin which gets either burned (bad for the atmosphere) or buried (helping to fill more land fills). It's probably also bad for the environment in that post office vans are used to transport the crap, pumping more carbon emissions into the atmosphere. I guess there is also the matter of the trees cut down to make the paper to print the junk.
See they haven't done much why should we respond by trying to cost them money and time?
It did occur to me that you could irritate them a bit more by returning the wong items to the companies. So Mr credit card guy gets a local pizza menu. I guess you could also fill in funny details like micky mouse, disney avenue call 01777 - bite my ass. Although I am pretty sure that's illegal so don't do that! Although I assume it's legal to return the stuff with the words "no thank you very much Mr Bank guy I don't want a credit card" scrawled across the front of the form in black marker. That's just being polite.
As you know the Government will do dick to stop this. If it's profitable expect only a cosmetic response. Then again don't discount the power of a lot of individuals working together!
You notice I didnt mention rage once. In this case I didn't think I had to.
Amoungst the more useful stuff I get regularly are things like free papers, Pizza menus, curry menus, chinese food menus (don't get me wrong I don't want this stuff it just may come in useful one day). I also get a lot of adverts for things, credit cards, home loans, blinds, estate agents. I even get some stuff posted that you are meant to give back! They post their crappy catalogue showing the full range of DIY tools you can buy through your door then come to collect it a few days later. By which time you have of course binned it as the rubbish that it is. You then have to explain to them why you are not going to give them £1.50 to pay for it.
"You put it through my letter box it becomes mine, if I throw my property away that's my business. No, putting £1.50 on the catalogue doesn't mean I have to pay you. In fact you want me to keep it I should charge you rent. It might be a catalogue to you but to me it's just more crap that I have to throw out. Now off with you before I unleash the hounds".
Have these people never heard of deforestation? What about keep Britain tidy? What about don't drop your crap through my letter box without me actually asking for it? If I want to buy DIY tools I will go to a DIY shop, If I want a credit card I will look at the available ones and choose one that way. Pissing me off is not the way to gain my custom.
I have to dispose of loads of this stuff. Some of it like credit card applications come partially filled in with my details (these I have to shred), some is just wordy crap.
A while back some one mentioned a method to fight back. A lot of these companies include a postage paid return envelope. It was suggested that you can remove all your details from the form then post it back to them. This has the advantage of getting rid of the junk mail and returning it to the originator. Poetic huh? What is even more beautiful is that they have been charged for the postage on the envelope that you have used to return their unasked for rubbish to them.
Perhaps if they get enough back this way they will consider another way of reaching people? Or at least it will be massively inconvienient to them (there is always a bright side).
I couldn't possibly say I condone responding as above, after all what have these companies done to us?
Well, they have bombarded us with a large amount of unasked for junk mail. I guess this is bad for the environment as it mostly goes straight in the bin which gets either burned (bad for the atmosphere) or buried (helping to fill more land fills). It's probably also bad for the environment in that post office vans are used to transport the crap, pumping more carbon emissions into the atmosphere. I guess there is also the matter of the trees cut down to make the paper to print the junk.
See they haven't done much why should we respond by trying to cost them money and time?
It did occur to me that you could irritate them a bit more by returning the wong items to the companies. So Mr credit card guy gets a local pizza menu. I guess you could also fill in funny details like micky mouse, disney avenue call 01777 - bite my ass. Although I am pretty sure that's illegal so don't do that! Although I assume it's legal to return the stuff with the words "no thank you very much Mr Bank guy I don't want a credit card" scrawled across the front of the form in black marker. That's just being polite.
As you know the Government will do dick to stop this. If it's profitable expect only a cosmetic response. Then again don't discount the power of a lot of individuals working together!
You notice I didnt mention rage once. In this case I didn't think I had to.
posted by Student at 11:01 am
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