Junk Mail….
Being the good and dedicated Waste Watcher that I am, today I was leafing through WEEK 1 of Karen Cannard’s Rubbish Diet Challenge….
There are loads of great tips on there about how to Slim Your Bin, but it was Chapter 4, Say NO to Junk Mail that caught my eye.
I know it can all be recycled, but junk mail is really annoying.
So, I am cracking down on junk mail. And if you want to too, then here’s how!
- Contact the Mail Preference Service
To get your name removed from mailing lists.
There are several ways to do this:
You can phone: Registration Line 0845 703 4599
You could be crazy and write…Address: FREEPOST 29 LON20771, London, W1E 0ZT
Or you can fax:020 7323 4226
Or e-mail: mps@dma.org.uk
Or you can do what I did and go online: www.mpsonline.org.uk/mpsr/
It took all of about 2 mniutes-hurrah! According to Karen’s post it can take up to 4 months to see the full effect of registering, BUT your name will be removed from 95% of UK mailing lists
- Opt out of Royal Mails door to door service
ie all the crap the poor postie has to lug around, for you to then just put straight in the recycling…
You can write to them at:
Royal Mail Door to Door Opt Outs
Freepost RRBT-ZBXB-TTTS
Kingsmead House
Oxpens Road
OXFORD
OX1 1RX
Or you can do what I did and e-mail them: optout@royalmail.com
I got a response the same day. Warning me of all the dire things that might happen should I choose to pot out. Like not getting anymore crappy mail I don’t want…
You then have to download a form to fill out and send off.
So they like to make it as difficult as possible..!
- Phone directories
Does anyone actually use them anymore? You can ask not to be sent one by ringing up each company:
BT Phone book: 0800 833 400
Yellow Pages: 0800 671 444
Thomson Local: 01252 555 555
And if you have some at home sitting gathering dust, they can be recycled at your local household waste centre
- Visit this great site Stop Junk Mail
Which has some great resources:
You can buy ‘No Junk Mail’ stickers for £0.90 to put on your front door/letterbox, OR you could just make your own..!
And it has links to the JunkBuster widget (I have no idea what a widget is I’m afraid) that apparently allows you to opt-out of up to 6 junk mail suppliers in one go.
The scary stat attached to this is that by doing so you could save on 11kgs of junk mail a year….
- Catalogues
If you are an avid shopper (not of the charity shop variety…) and get lots of catalogues, I’m afraid it is a case of collecting them all up, and then spending half an hour ringing them all up to ask them to take you off their mailing list.
- Switch to paperless billing
And finally, it’s not really junk mail, but you can cut down on the paper in your post box by switching your bank account, and utilities, to paperless billing.
So come on then, who is with me in Saying No to Junk Mail..?!
