Hi, I received a card from singapore today! I like to keep track of the actual date when the post office cancelled the stamp, I’d say this is cancelled 15 july 2024. However my adress was given out 14 june 2024 by postcrossing. Do I misinterpret the stamp or did the sender just sent it a month later? Not that I mind it was sent later, I was just curious 
Thanks for helping 
It does feel like 15-Jul-2024 
super fast travel
Maybe the person sent it in right time, but the post office sent the postcard a month later. This happens often in my postoffice, postmen forget to empty the box 
I believe it was sent later!
Our mailboxes are emptied daily so the mail is processed on the day itself at the main processing centre if posted before the collection time (usually 5pm in the neighbourhood, 7pm in the city area)
Interesting question. Back on July 9th, 2024 I mailed a FDC to a customer in Germany. Days later, it was returned to me as “Undeliverable As Addressed” Now the yellow label smacked on my out envelope showed the date as July 12, 2024. I am convinced that my envelope never left the US! There is no way a piece of mail goes from the US to Germany and back in 3 days.
For me the stamp is not really readable, could be July as well as June.
Sure there is. I had a mail piece sent, delivered two days later from West Coast USA to East Coast (This has only happened once). Here’s my theory, If:
1 - there’s a mistake, or
2 - if there’s not enough overnight mail volume, then:
Your mail piece gets tossed in the next day bucket (flown to the hub destination).
Before I went back to my post office I confirmed with my customer the address I was given was correct; he confirmed the address was correct. That being so, there no mistake in the address. Regarding mail traveling within the US, I sent my accountant my tax package by Priority Mail. He lives in the same state as me…32 miles away. He got my “Priority Mail” envelope 18 days later. He had to request an extension from the IRS.
A few years back, someone sent me an envelope from 2 hours away. It took 3 months to delivery. Just crazy.
Off-topic, but was there any sticker like one of these on the envelope?
If not, I’d say USPS is at fault here. Domestic letters are normally delivered on the next day here, but a return might take even up to two weeks within the country as all undeliverable mail has to go through one of a few centralised sorting facilities — so I think it’s impossible for a letter to travel over the Atlantic twice in such a short period of time.
@duck2006 …yes that was exactly my point. I don’t believe it ever left the country (the US). The only label on it was a USPS label. Ironically, the same day I brought the returned item to my post office, I mailed another item to Germany. The latter part of address formats to Germany is: the post code, the city and Germany; so it was properly formatted.
I asked my clerk: does it sound reasonable to you that an envelope goes to Germany and back in three days? He ignored the question.
@FiFTX I am sure it is cancelled 15-Jul-2024. The last letter is likely an L, because it definitely is not an N, as @Seracker’s picture clearly shows.
It is quite possible that the card was mailed a month after the address was obtained. This has happened with me, too. If I need to obtain a specific postcard so I have something fitting the recipient’s profile, that can take time. And sometimes life just gets in the way, and I don’t get back to Postcrossing for a while. You got the card, so all is good.
Yeah, that’s what I thought as well Like I said, it’s not an issue at all, it was just curiousity and quite interesting because the date was almost exactly a month later, which is a funny coincidence, isn’t it? And not gonna lie, the post was rapid, I did not expect a card to arrive in 8! (more precisely 7 days, I registered a day late as well) days from singapore to germany
Thanks for your help all
I like drawing German addresses as they tend to be registered swiftly (usually within 2 weeks, but most tend to take about a week or so)
For this year I have sent 76 cards (out of 155, 38.1%) to Germany and the average travel time is 13 days
(This number is distorted by some cards that took a month, 40+ days to be registered, but yeah, like I said, most reach within two weeks)
As I think that the date of the stamp has probably been found out, and this discussion is now off-topic, I will close here.
