Hello! I am new to Postcrossing and I am enjoying it a lot! I have encountered a situation, which I have a question about:
What is there to do if I see that a postcrosser has not registered cards since May and has not been on for 17 days. I definitely understand that it is all a waiting game and that is part of the process. I just wondered, if it appears someone is no longer participating, how is that dealt with or is it not?
Thank you in advance for your suggestions!
I understand that you have drawn the address of that particular postcrosser.
Well, there’s only one thing you do: you send them a card.
There are all kinds of reasons for people to not register cards for a while or not log in. Maybe they took a break and just started again. Who knows.
But it doesn’t matter, because when you requested an address you agreed to send a postcard to whichever address you get. So please do just that.
The system only gives you an address of someone who has been active in a certain amount of time and is eligible for a postcard.
If a user doesn’t log in for a long time their address will not be given out.
The Postcrossing algorithm is quite complex and sophisticated and while, of course, it isn’t perfect, it takes care of a lot of things and it does a very good job doing so!
Thank you! I have done just as you have suggested! Just need to keep the cogs turning, right?
Thank you for your reply!
I don’t pay any mind to when someone was last active. I’ve pulled their address, it’s now my job to send them a card. If they register or not is up to fate!
That is a very short time frame, no need to be worried.
17 days is not that long, people don’t log in every day if they have nothing to register/send. Or they are busy with exams, or work, or something else in their life… it is really too short a time to worry.
Not registering for 3 months might just mean they didn’t receive any cards for 3 months, maybe they don’t send much. I sometimes have gaps of 1-2 months simply because I receive a lot all at once and then for ages I am not due any cards. Even though I log in more often than I should 
Sometimes people do disappear without registering, unfortunately, but you can never tell. Someone like you describe wouldn’t really worry me. Others do, but your part of the deal is to send a postcard (and I have sent to people that I thought would disappear but instead registered promptly, and to people that seemed very active and then never were seen again).
Oh and in terms of dealing with inactivity, if someone doesn’t log in for over a month (but apparently there are other factors too so this is not an exact science) their address is not given out. 17 is well within the time range. You will never get an address of someone last seen 6 months ago. But if they come back and are due cards, then you will.
I just drew the address of a Postcrosser from a neighboring EU country who registered her latest card in December 2020 (9 months ago).
She sent her latest card in March 2021. She joined several years ago and has sent and received more than 1000 postcards so far. There is a significant gap between sent and received postcards (she would need to receive / register 200 additional postcards to achieve some kind of balance).
She logged in a day ago and seems to be a Forum member (participating in some tags recently).
Just wondering if I should bring her official profile to the attention of the PC team, given the lack of official activity for such a long time.
Could there be an alternative (more encouraging) explanation for this? Perhaps she set her official profile inactive back then and has only very recently set it active again?
Yeah, I think this is the first assumption I would make, too. Maybe she went inactive before moving to another place but kept sending postcards 
I went inactive recently when moving house but continued sending postcards. I racked up quite a big difference between sent and received cards. I did have a few people enquire after they drew my profile because of the difference and why I hadn’t registered any cards in several months. It’s because I hadn’t received any! We can’t know why people have deficits or why they haven’t logged in, all we have to do is send a postcard to whoever we have drawn.
This was also my first assumption.
For example: At the moment I have sent 2,921 cards and received 2,794. I’ve been inactive for about two months. I also had a little break with sending, but I continued sending weeks before I got back to active. By the way - on the day I set my account to inactive I was equal with 2,785 sent / received.
And I’ve seen profiles with a far greater difference.
In my opinion there’s no need to contact the support at that point.
I understand how you feel. I have four expired ones and a few of them are people who have not logged in for a few months. Some of the postcards do get lost or damaged, but some people might have moved, been ill or they just stopped participating.
I know that I am busy during the summer months and dont do as much with postcards. Other reasons: busy at work, traveling, out of stamps etc
Update: the profile I mentioned yesterday morning (8 September) now suddenly shows 10 new cards all registered on 8 September (after the one registered 9 months ago, in December 2020). 
Thank you to those who have replied to my Qs, in any case. 
Hey there!
I am starting to get the hang of Postcrossing, using the Forum, direct swaps, going through people’s accounts to see how active they are…and I was just assigned a person’s address who has not registered any cards in a year and a half.
I am going to message them to ask them if their account is still active, but if they do not reply is there anyway to remove this card from my travelling ones so I can send another that will go to an active user?
You’ll see that the person must’ve logged in in the past 30 days. Maybe they were inactive for some time, but you won’t be assigned the address of someone who hasn’t been on the site in more than a month. Trust the system and send your card. 
The rules are that you send the card to the address you are given. My first card expired this week and it was to someone who is very active. Some make it, some don’t, some are stuck to the inside of post boxes, some are delivered to the wrong address. C’est la vie, those are the rules of the game 
Hey,
there is absolutely no reason to message them before sending your card or contacting the Postcrossing team. If this address was assigned to you by the Postcrossing algorithm, it means that the person is due a postcard AND has recently been active. You are just (one of) the person(s) that sends a card to them after a period of inactivity.
Whenever you have gotten an address assigned to you, you always have to send a postcard!
They might have taken a break from sending. That is fine to do. And then they sent a postcard recently which got registered. Our maybe they have set their account to inactive earlier, with postcards due. And then turned the account back to active now.
Anyway, they are due one postcard. And they have logged in during the last 30 days. If not you wouldn’t have received their address.
Thanks everyone!
I am still new so I was not sure how to tell if someone is active or not, but now I see that the “seen” section will show when they have last been on. And of course I am not trying to cheat the system by not sending someone a card, I am just curious about accounts that look like they havn’t sent or received postcards in a long time.
I understand that its a random draw and I’m not trying to get around that!
F.ex. I turned my profile inactive few months ago because school work just takes so much time and energy at the moment. I do send card or two every now and then. It’s easier since I can do it whenever I have a bit extra time. Registering cards must be done asap (I don’t want them to lay around the tables waiting too long)
Also I know some people who have been inactive out of their mobile work, lack of regular address, postal box etc… and therefore they are due a lot of cards 
various reasons can be found
Also a lot of people leave for a while then come back. It’s not so weird to stop and restart a hobby.
Last year I kept getting addresses of people, especially in the USA, that had been away for years and years and got back into postcrossing because of the pandemic, as a home-based hobby.
If you look at people’s stats, it’s not so unusual to see gaps, some people come and go depending on their circumstances/wishes.