Universal Mail UK - more examples

A couple of years ago I wrote about the alternative mail service for international postcards operated by Universal Mail UK.  On a recent visit to Ireland I took the opportunity to drive from northern Donegal to Dublin through Northern Ireland and post some cards with special UMUK stamps.

Here are examples sent to Australia and India, almost certainly treated by Royal Mail as normal - that's the only explanation for their rapid transit.

Universal Mail UK Northern Ireland stamp postmarked at Belfast's Northern Ireland Mail Centre and on arrival in India.  

Neither date is legible but these were posted on 10 June, and the Indian one was acknowledged on 8 July.

The card to Australia has a clear arrival mark at the Northern Mail Centre of 23 June, so certainly didn't go to UMUK!

Universal Mail UK Northern Ireland stamp postmarked at Belfast's Northern Ireland Mail Centre and on arrival in Australia.  

Update 27 July - I have now received a picture of one sent to New Zealand which has a clearer 10 June postmark from the Northern Ireland Mail Centre.  It arrived while the recipient was on holiday so some time during the last two weeks. 

Universal Mail UK Northern Ireland stamp postmarked at Belfast's Northern Ireland Mail Centre but with no arrival mark from New Zealand and nothing to suggest that UMUK were involved.

 

There were others: they may not yet have arrived!

 

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Mail to Australia - correctly paid in 1990 but underpaid in 1970.

Reader MikeM has sent two examples of mail to Australia.  The 1970 letter is underpaid, the 1990 postcard properly paid but with an unusual postmark.

Starting with the postcard.  29p paid the worldwide airmail postcard from 2 October 1989 to 16 September 1990 when it rose to 31p.  For the collector of 'solo use' this is the obvious way to find them. 

29p Machin solo use on airmail postcard to Australia 25 May 1990.

The original deep mauve stamp was issued in 26 September 1989 in sheets printed by Harrisons on phosphor paper (SG X979).   It was also printed in booklets of 4, in litho by Walsall, and issued on the date the rate came into force, 2 October 1989.  These litho printings are quite distinctive, not least because the stamps have two phosphor bands and the booklet pane is imperforate on three sides.  These (SG X1054) should not be difficult to find.

Although these booklets were available from most post offices they were also sold by tourist destinations in addition to the domestic rate booklets.  Having one worldwide rate meant that they only had one airmail booklet to stock.   

The booklet was reprinted on phosphor paper and issued on 17 April 1990 with imperforate edges as before (SG X1055).  This is probably more difficult to find due to its shorter usage period.

From 17 September 1990 the 29p stamp paid the under 10gr airmail rate for Printed Papers to Zones A and B (basically the whole world outside Europe excluding Australasia and the far east of Asia.  I suspect these are much more difficult to find.

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Mike's other piece is pre-decimal, a 1970 letter also to Australia, bearing the rarely seen 2 x 10d stone stamps, SG 741.  The potential problem here is that 2 x 10d = 1s 8d, and the correct rate was 1s 9d. evidently the Post Office didn't take the time to surcharge this international item for 1d, but they were not slow to do so for domestic mail.

Pair of 10d drab stamps on Airmail letter to Australia, May 1970, underpaying the 1s 9d rate by 1d.

The question which will never be answered is why were the 10d stamps used at all?  I don't think it was because the writer used them for an 8 ounce inland letter in July1968 when issued, or for a 10 ounce second class letter after the introduction of two-tier post from 16 September 1968. 

Much more likely is that they had some for sending airmail postcards to Australia, as 10d was the rate from 3 October 1966 to decimalisation on 15 February 1971. 

Or perhaps the sender was a collector, using a variety of stamps on different letters?  Whatever the circumstances they got the rate wrong! 

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Relaunch of the Postal History of the World blog.

Five years after I set it up I have made the first substantive post to my World Postal History blog.

Read about the connection between a registered airmail cover from Soviet Russia to England and a famous Hollywood film star. 

Exploring Russian language, political place-name changing and industrial development, this story took an unexpected turn.

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Christmas 2025 produces a mixed bag of modern postal history!

We always expect at the busy Christmas period there will be oddities in the mail.  No longer postmarks from Universal machines, but sometimes oddities of other sorts.

Of course the invalidation of the old Machin and country definitives has opened up more opportunities for Royal Mail Revenue Protection teams to show how they have been confused by management decisions and a lack of clear information.  

It is obvious that they need huge posters in the mail centres that can be seen from the other side of the room: then maybe individual operators would not refer so much to the RP teams, and the RP teams wouldn't find so many occasions to get it wrong.

Of course some just can't be bothered, hence this one was delivered in December 2025 - no date sadly - but it was, without postal markings or surcharge.  (And no, it wasn't hand delivered with the stamp just a decoration.) 

This one, on the other hand....  if you don't follow the GB new issues blogs (mine and Commonwealth Stamps Opinion) you might be forgiven for not recognising that this is a recently issued stamp.  

Sure, it looks a bit like the 5d one issued in 1970 but I doubt that anyone working as a postman now remembers that.   No, this has the head of King Charles on it and was issued on 27 November 2025. 

And here it is, used and processed through Birmingham Mail Centre on 18th(?) December 2025.  Three weeks and it's surcharged as being 'No Longer Valid for Postage', surely the quickest invalidation of any British stamp!  (My thanks to Not Bruce on Stampboards for this.)

If anybody has other examples of Christmas season madness, please email them to me for inclusion here.

 

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More properly used special stamps - but they aren't very common

It's 12 months since I started the last post on usage of special stamps in a normal period of use, usually reckoned to be up to six months after issue.  There are so many new issues nowadays that unless people specifically want to use one from a particular set, you are likely to use the latest one that they can get.  With Christmas coming it's a chance for some examples of the less common Large Letter and Airmail Christmas stamps to make an appearance.

But first some older ones which were provided by readers.

2nd class dog stamp issued in June used in September 2024  

2nd class dog stamp issued June 2024 used in September.

2nd class Churchill stamp issued 30 November used 19 December 2024. 

2nd class Churchill stamp issued 30 November used 19 December 2024.

 Valour & Victory Stamps used in the months after issue

Valour & Victory 1st class stamp, featuring Lillian Bader, used 29/07/2025

Valour & Victory Thomas Pierson Frank used 26/08/2025.

 

Valour & Victory Mahinder Singh Pujii, used from Cornwall 24/09/2025.

Valour & Victory William Tutte, Bletchley Park Codebreaker, used from Cornwall, 18/10/2025.

Dungeons and Dragons: a reader in the Phillipines wanted the D&D set, so these are two covers I sent to have them properly used.  A pair of 1st class, a pair of £2.50 and a 10p definitive paid the rate for International Signed For.  Contrived philatelic? of course, but still used at the right time.

Monopoly - a pair of 1st class used for the £3.40 rate to Canada (thanks to SS)

Se-tenant pair of 1st class Monopoly stamps paying the £3.40 rateto Canada November 2025

Christmas 2025 - we'll all get some, but how many of us will get all of them?

2nd class on postcard used internally 

£3.40 airmail rate to Canada used 14 November (thanks to SS).

2025 Christmas £3.40 (airmail rate) to Canada 14/11/2025

 

Will there be more?  Of course, it would be especially nice to see the Queen Victoria stamps on stamps.  Send us scans and we will add them here. 

 

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Unusual surcharge label appears over two years after stamp invalidations

Following on from the previous post of an Antigua stamp being accepted through the mail at Sheffield Mail Centre, JW has sent this image from Reddit of a Christmas stamp being rejected by Royal Mail's Revenue Protection team somewhere.

Christmas 2010 1st class stamp declared invalid in 2025.

This one has a 2010 1st class Wallace & Gromit Christmas stamp which has been declared 'No Longer Valid for Postage'.  I'm hesitant to say that this label hasn't been reported before - I certainly can't recall it but surely it has been recorded somewhere?

Surcharge label with QR code - try it, it works!

Ironically, if Revenue Protection officers who applied this label had scanned the code it would have taken them to the Royal Mail app, specifically this page:

From the Royal Mail app Swap Out Scheme page

Whilst the 2010 stamp isn't shown, there is a Christmas stamp there.  Basically it's nonsense, incompetent and it's about time Revenue Protection sorted themselves out.  

 

And if they can't get it right, why should the general public?  

 

There are over 50 comments on that Reddit thread at least 7 users were telling everybody else, sometimes repeatedly, that all stamps had to have baarcodes.  One of the people putting them right was a postmaster however, so hopefully seven more people now know the true position.  Sadly none of them appear to work for Revenue Protection.

But back to the QR code - has anyone seen this before?

 

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Aything goes - sometimes!

There is little distinctive now about Royal Mail's stamp issues to make them stand out from those of any other country - save that they have a tiny profile of the monarch's head on - and they aren't unique in that respect. 

Wildlife, comic-book heroes, film and tv franchises - not quite as prolific as Australia but many of these subjects have appeared from other stamp-issuing territories around the world. 

That's the only explanation for this escaping the attention of Revenue Protection officers.

Antigua & Barbuda $2 Star Trek stamp depicting Lt Sulu used at Sheffield Mail Centre 31/10/2025

Yes, it's StarTrek, marked 5 years ago by Royal Mail and covering the whole franchise which explains the omission of Lt Sulu from the set.  

But Sheffield Mail Centre happily passed this one through as if it was, what?  2nd class?  £2?  The British stamps didn't even have the name of the show on them, the only caption being to identify the characters.  

(Lest anyone thinks that inclusion of 'Great Britain' in the address means that it originated outside the UK, my correspondent assures me that it came from Goole.) 

But it's not the first, and won't be the last.  Last year (as shown on the other blog) Royal Mail - and possibly Post Office Ltd - accepted this set of WWF stamps - from Tristan da Cunha!

And we have previously been able to report this one from 2015 with a couple of stamp-on-stamps from St Helena, a pair of kestrels from the Falkland Is, and one Jersey stamp making the £1.41 rate - and cancelled at a post office branch in Rochdale.

With millions of mail items being processed daily of course some will slip through - that's how 60/70 years ago it was possible to have letters delivered bearing national insurance stamps, green shield trading stamps, and other non-postage stamps.

But there aren't so many now and the equipment is more sophisticated.  But really, one thematically illustrated postage stamp looks much like another.  70 years ago it wasn't worth charging postage due when it was only 6d and it cost more to collect it.  With 'Unpaid' charges now being astronomically higher, that argument doesn't apply.

But they are all fun to collect - let us know if you have any more,

 

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