One swap from January reached China and one official card reached after traveling 160 days. I hope the trend continues and the ban can be lifted soon.
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I hope it gets better soon, too. I got a card from a young man in China today and I saw that it was his very first card he sent. I hope their situation improves soon so he will be able to get a card back, so he doesn’t become too disappointed and give up PostCrossing. I sent him a message telling him how happy his card made me and that I wished the best for him in PostCrossing!
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Not sure how up to date this info is, but on the country stats page it shows members in China having sent 2,834,963 and having received 2,690,249…I assume this means that 144,714 cards have not yet been received/registered. If they are all piled up in post offices I wonder how long until they are delivered?
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Since the suspension Chinese Postcrossers have sent in the region of 35000 cards, so this has to be considered in the stats. Somewhere around 25000 “missing” , ie. long travelling/expired cards have been registered since the suspension. No doubt the team is keeping an eye on how many cards should have been registered by now.
One thing for sure, when the suspension is lifted there will be a lot of Chinese addresses being given out.
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As with extra slots which
it appears that something similar has been implemented before. So a variation of that is not totally out of the question. (Quoted by someone else. The original post was deleted though)
As with why World Postcard Day, and even Postcrossing stamp releases, are brought in the discussion here, it is because they are also based on a fair postcard exchange system. The physical backlogs are not handled here. The real problem is users’ frustration and the direct cause of that is the 60-day expiry rule. Now that the suspension is in place, I hope it’s not just wait-and-see but instead a transition period towards revising the rules to better fit the current situation.
Postcrossing is free to use, but at the same time, it is a registered entity in Portugal and also accepts donations, which I assume comes with certain responsibilities too, especially as it gets official endorsement from more and more postal services worldwide through stamp issuance.
Your tone is menacing and accusatory here. What are you accusing Postcrossing of?
Donations are not the same as purchases, and your assumption about responsibilities tied to donations is likely way off the mark. I donate to Postcrossing happily because I think the project is fantastic. I have zero expectations or assumptions with regards to my donation. A donation is not the same as a purchase.
Your veiled accusation is very unfair in my opinion. I fervently hope this is a language issue at play here, and that you are unaware of the weightiness of what you wrote.
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As you wrote, Postcrossing is a free website that is ran by volunteer work of the admins. Donation is something you do because you want to. People donate to Postcrossing because they love this idea and hobby. You cannot ask the admins to do something specific because they get donations from the users.
Also I think the admins clearly know that they must be responsible for the service, and that is why they made this decision. Because they cannot keep lots of people waiting for their postcards to China be registered forever. I understand that Chinese users are deeply disappointed by this, but I don’t think that you can go like “You get donated money, be responsible”… because they are trying their best to be responsible for everyone.
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You’re entitled to your opinion.
One responsibility that I referred to is to give proper priority to the following undertakings.
- Maintain a fair system for postcard exchanges
- Organize World Postcard Day
- Collaborate with postal authorities on official Postcrossing stamps
Another thing I’ve been trying to point out here is the internal cause of Postcrossing backlogs, which I think is the 60-day expiry rule that is being applied uniformly, and at a time when mail delivery to China is unreliable, traps people into waiting forever for their postcard to be registered. What is lacking is flexibility. Given the long waiting times and potential money loss, it seems to me a single 60-day expiry rule no longer works well enough, hence my suggestion for extra slots for postally unreliable destinations (that is, China). It now seems less impossible as it was mentioned that a similar feature had been implemented before.
I wonder if extra slots were provided, how might it work or not work?
Providing extra slots for those who got Chinese address seems inefficient for me, as it won’t be helpful for China Post to solve its backlog. One of the main purposes of this suspension is, in my opinion, to give some time for China Post to improve its backlogs of mails. Giving extra slots might prevent people from waiting until their cards get registered, but it will only result in the increase of mails kept in the post offices in China.
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The kind of extra slots I’m picturing are like this:
- Provided in another category for postally unreliable destinations (basically China)
- Longer expiry period (120 days, 180 days, etc)
- Do not encroach on existing normal slots
- If the card does get registered, it still contributes to one’s sent total
What it means if implemented:
- Senders get to choose whether to take the risk and use an extra slot
- Since this is an extra slot, it’s up to the sender to judge by themselves if mail will be delivered or not
- Recipients can choose whether to receive postcards as usual (by setting their account inactive)
- The system continues to collect official data on mail delivery
I understand official postcards increase China-bound mail load, but I also think the effect is negligible, considering people are still sending mail to China through forum activities, and of course, outside Postcrossing. However, extra slots, or other better alternatives, will make the system fairer.
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Today my first postcard to China arrived after 91 days. 
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I still don’t get how the 60 day expiry matters. In fact, that’s your extra slot, because after the 60 days you get a new slot wether your card arrived or not. So surely a longer period would be more frustrating with slots being occupied that way?
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I’m thinking why would the extra slot need expire date at all? It could be registered within a year.
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and much more complicated I guess…
However, everyone who thinks they know better or can do better than the admins of postcrossing know or do is free to create their own fairer alternative free of charge postcard-exchange-website…
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The internal cause of the backlogs is that the recipient’s address is given out again when a due postcard expires. To clarify,
- Normal category
- Traveling postcards (≤60 days)
- Expired postcards (61–365 days)
- Second category (for postally unreliable destinations. And these are the “extra slots” I meant)
- Traveling postcards (say, ≤120 days)
- Expired postcards (120–365 days)
My question is still if the second category were created, how it might work or not work. I guess some will try out the new feature while others skip it. Regarding the comments above,
- If one feels it’d be frustrating, don’t use the feature.
- If one feels it’s too complicated, don’t use the feature.
How does Postcrossing be endorsed through Postcrossing stamps? They don’t get the money from the sale of the stamps.
Please explain how the extra slots will be created!
If I have 10 slots… than 1% of these are extra = category 2, means I can send 9 cards first category 1 and 1 card second category. Or is it like 10 cards normal way and x cards the other category?
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And if one feels that the Postcrossing system is just beyond their understanding or not meeting with their expectations…one is always free to create their own free, postcard swapping platform…as mentioned above. That rather unpleasant saying just popped into my head…to beat a dead dog…
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The endorsement that I’m talking about is of course not in monetary terms but refers to the legitimacy or status that Postcrossing gets from such official stamp issuance. I assume the postal authorities are lending legitimacy based on the idea of an open and fair plaftform for postcard exchanges. It is still largely so, but this suspension, in my opinion, is casting doubt on it.
I’m thinking of a flat number to begin with, say, 1 or 2 extra slots. Many members have suggested an extra slot on World Postcard Day, but the demand for extra slots (for China) will be far more dispersed.
Postal Monitor may still be applied to the second category, although it monitors airmail. People may choose to send a postcard via surface mail instead, if that option is available. Alternatively, it can just be displayed as an alert.
The bottom line is, as long as not all the postal services outside China have stopped accepting mail to China, I feel there is a need to retain a channel for China-bound postcards on the official platform.
Well, it does not. If surface mail is available the route will not be blocked. But that’s a bit OT here… though many countries do no longer offer surface mail nowadays, so if air mail is not availabe, there are no other options.
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