Householders subscribe to this service, from Royal Mail (substitute name of local monopoly) which stops postal mail from being delivered to your house unless (a) you asked for it (you update a list of allowed companies via their website) (b) it's not a bulk mailing (you don't want to not receive birthday cards from your mates).
The post gets sent back (at the sorting office, thus saving the delivery people's time), and eventually, companies don't bother. probably.
-- neilp, Jul 29 2003

mail preference service http://www.mpsonline.org.uk
a 'server side' cleverer version of this [neilp, Oct 05 2004, last modified Oct 17 2004]

So, the post office has to go through every piece of your mail, and check its company with your 'allowed list' of companies?

The post office is paid to deliver the mail. Returning mass amounts of deliverable mail would result in lawsuits from the company sending the junk.

About half of the junk mail I get is addressed to 'occupant'. How would it stop this mail?
-- Cedar Park, Jul 29 2003


I sometimes think that the best idea would be to form a reaction group, collect all the junk mail from (e.g.) Barclay's Bank (Yes!, You!) and deliver it to the head office with a petition to be removed from the mailing list.
-- gnomethang, Jul 29 2003


yep [Cedar Park] although they go through it all already (automatically for 98%) to check for correct postage, post (zip) code and address, so I reckon it's not too much to ask. They also do redirection of post for £50 a year, so they already do data based services.
There's no reason to suggest that the law couldn't be changed if it was thought that this was a good suggestion.

I for one would definitely not add 'occupant' to my preferred senders list.
-- neilp, Jul 29 2003


hey [jutta], I know what you mean, but as a first effort, I'd rather pay £3/month if it meant less hassle for me, and less paper wastage for the planet ultimately. And totally agree about the source/destination mod.
-- neilp, Jul 29 2003


[gnomethang] just sign up to the mail protection service (see link), it'll do the trick
-- neilp, Jul 29 2003



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