Written in Mandarin (my profile doesn’t indicate that as a preferred language)
No ID number
Unusual postmark
Wrong address, not even remotely similar to mine
Address sequenced incorrectly, but all the components are there
Correct first name
98% similar last name
There’s no orange/black line to indicate machine sorting. Somehow this card, intended for my doppelgänger in California, made its way to me in North Carolina. I’m thinking there was manual sorting involved? I’ve heard of mail carriers assuming the wrong recipient on one street or in an apt building, but what about on the other side of the country?
It doesn’t actually sound like a Postcrossing-related card. It sounds like a Chinese tourist sending a card to her friend in California, complete with a cancellation from the Silja Symphony ferry on which the tourist was probably a passenger. Why it arrived at YOUR address, however, is a case for Sherlock Holmes. Have you tried Googling the address on the card, and maybe contacting the intended recipient?
That’s where I wonder if my involvement in PC made a USPS employee jump to an assumption. Instead of actually looking at the address, which had all the info needed to get the card to its intended recipient.
I’m planning to mail the card to her in an envelope with the correctly formatted address.
Send it on to Irvine CA. Likely a machine error. Ive recieved a Informed Deuevery notice of a card
Addresed to a Michigan address was to come to my box but in the end it never did. Just a strange coincidence. At least you will have an interesting story to tell the person you send it to.
This sort of happened to me recently except the recipient’s name is nothing remotely like mine. I can only imagine that the postcard was stuck to another Postcrossing postcard from France that was actually meant for me and the USPS just assumed all the postcards from France were for me. I ended up sticking it in an envelope and sending it back across the country.
i think my letter carrier does this i seem to get all the postcards on his route no matter what the address or name is and this is with my letter carrier knowing who i am. i am just the designated postcard lady lol i just plop them back into the mailstream (or return them to the post office) and they seem to get to the right place the second time around!
The card seems to be a Finnish one, from the serie Kehvola. It is sent from the ferry Silja Symhony and its Moomin stamp is postmarked in Helsinki Finland. The handwriting is clearly written by a Chinese person. The rest of this story is ???
Exactly why I’m so befuddled by how this card came to me. There’s no shared postal route to speak of, other than entry into the US. California and NC are a long ways away.
If our names almost matching is a coincidence, like @princeofasturias proposes, then it feels unbelievable.
It happened again! This time, an official PC card from Japan to Tennessee made its way to me one state and many ZIP codes over. I think if I drop it in outgoing as is, the card will make its way to the correct recipient, but I’m thinking I’ll put it in an envelope with a note.
Mystery (sort of) solved. Today, I received a PC card from the same sender, this time addressed to me. The JP card ID was off by 8, so they must’ve been sent out at the same time and travelled together. Though it’s funny I received the incorrect one before the correct one
this can happen. It happened to me twice that a postcard was forwarded to me - one from CZ that was sent to a postcrosser in the USA (I’m in Germany) and one from Russia, that was delivered to someone not that far from me. Both times names as well as addresses were not similar at all.
One I have received an official card from Russia that was not meant for me. Luckily I found out before registering the card. I always read the message right before registering and wondered why I was addressed by the wrong name. This one was to a lady in my postcrode area but name and street were not similar at all to mine.
Strange, how mail travelles sometimes. Makes me wonder about all my expired cards
One of my RAS cards was attached to another post card I sent (different person, different place). It was stuck to the sticky strip that the post office uses. Luckily the person that got the extra card was nice enough to take it to the post office and it continued on it’s journey.
My understanding is that the PC system only recognizes the logged-in user ID of the intended recipient when registering cards. Worst case, you would’ve gotten an error message since the card didn’t “belong” to you.
i seem to get all the postcards on his route no matter what the address or name is and this is with my letter carrier knowing who i am. i am just the designated postcard lady lol i just plop them back into the mailstream (or return them to the post office) and they seem to get to the right place the second time around!
There’s no shared postal route to speak of, other than entry into the US. California and NC are a long ways away.
