Don't guess, correctly address!
Tuesday, 02 March 2010
Australia Post is urging everyone to help make their local postie's task a little easier by ensuring all mail items are correctly addressed.
Approximately three million mail items are received at Australia Post Mail Redistribution Centres or Dead Letter Offices across the country each year because they are incorrectly addressed.
Australia Post spokesperson, Rachelle McDonald, said the corporation makes every effort to ensure mail reaches its intended recipient and while approximately 50% of mail received at the Mail Redistribution Centre will eventually reach its destination, unfortunately the rest wont.
"The worst offending areas across the country include Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and the Gold Coast," Ms McDonald said.
"Mail that is unable to be delivered is auctioned off after a period of three to 12 months depending on the item and all proceeds are donated to charity.
"By making sure you address all of your mail using the addressee's suburb name and postcode will help get the mail delivered to the right recipient and will ensure customers receive items of importance or value on time."
Correctly addressing mail is really quite easy. The basic address format consists of three lines; the addressee's full name on the first line, followed by a street name and number, or post office box number. The suburb, state and postcode should be printed in capitals on the last line.
Senders should also always include their return address on the back of the envelope, so that if it is unable to be delivered, Australia Post can return it to them.
For more information on correct addressing, including how to format addresses and to search for postcodes, people should visit the Australia Post website at www.auspost.com.au/correctaddress and take advantage of the address formatting tool.