Today I helped a friend mail several letters and postcards to the United Kingdom (from California). This friend is American, currently lives in England, and is in the US visiting her family.
Armed with a small scale we went to the USPS website, figured out the proper postage, and affixed sufficient US stamps for First-Class Mail International to each item. No problem.
My friend then produced some blue stickers carrying the words “Par Avion”, “Air Mail”, and “Royal Mail”, and insisted that each item needed to have one. I wasn’t real sure about this, based on prior experience sending her stuff, but didn’t argue - one was attached to each piece. I tossed the letters in a mailbox about an hour ago, and I’m pretty confident they’ll get there, but questions remain in my mind about those mystical blue stickers.
It appears that they are known as Airmail etiquette. Their true purpose, however, remains unclear to me.
Do these stickers actually cause mail to handled differently? How? Are they possibly only relevant on items mailed from the UK? Are letters mailed without 'em going to get stuffed in a cargo ship and delivered in 8-10 weeks?
As far as I’m aware, the USPS has no analogous labels - I just send stuff First-Class Mail International. I’ve heard of (but never seen) “airmail stamps”, but I’ve read that they don’t really mean anything - they’re just stamps, and can be used like any others. That wiki page I linked says, “The airmail etiquette may be omitted if airmail stamps are used on the letter, and in some cases even this is not necessary if a country sends out all its foreign mail by air.” Is the US such a country?
I hope I don’t sound like a complete tool, and seek the wisdom of the more postally-acquianted dopers…
If they don’t now, they used to. I have some stickers around here somewhere that are blue and say ‘Air Mail’ and ‘Par Avion’ in white on them. I got them at a USPO.
This website says that all letters going overseas have to have a “Par Avion/Air Mail” sticker.
I only pick them up every few years because I don’t send that many overseas letters. The last time I picked some up at the post office they gave them to me for free.
Any time I’ve been in a foreign country (I’m in Canada), and wanted to mail something home, I’ve always been able to get “Air Mail/Par Avion” stickers at the post office (even in the US). They’re free, just ask for them; and as long as you’ve affixed them and the proper postage, your item will go via air.
“Royal Mail” really means nothing; if your friend had used USPS stickers, your friend’s pieces would have been handled the same way. Our post office in Canada was once known as “Royal Mail”; it changed to “Canada Post” when Canadians decided it didn’t need to sound so British.
Interestingly, the words “Par Avion” have appeared on every sticker I’ve used from anywhere in the world, although the words “Air Mail” have not. When I sent stuff from Greece or Morocco, it had (I assume) the Greek or Arabic equivalent of “air mail” plus “Par Avion,” and when I sent stuff from Italy or Switzerland, or other non-English-but-still-Latin-alphabet nation, it had the native language plus “Par Avion,” which is, of course, French. Does anybody know why French is always present on air mail stickers?
IANAPW (or about to go postal), but my WAG is that the automatic sorting process that letters go through is designed to sort out blue stickered letters into a pile for the International Postal Division.
It is theoretically possible that mail not marked “Air Mail” could end up on a ship. It’s not likely (assuming we’re talking about a small letter, parcels are a different business) because, absent instructions, the mail services use whatever means of shipping they like. That’s usually a plane for international stuff, but it could conceivably be a ship. The sticker just helps by making your intentions clear: regular mail can travel by any means, but air mail must go by, well, air. You could write “Air Mail” on the envelope and it should still be OK - provided you put the right postage on it, of course.
Any time I’ve been to a US post office to send something internationally, generally to the UK, they’ve used a red stamp that reads “Air Mail”, and not a blue sticker.
My guess would be that mail handlers worldwide know what these things look like, regardless of what languages they speak. So it probably isn’t necessary to have the text in French, or English, or…whatever. It’s just a custom.
I send things overseas all the time and have never used a “Par Avion” sticker. They’re like airmail stamps – something that was once required, but is no longer. I do send most things Priority Mail these days, but I sent them regular mail and they only took a few days to arrive in places as far away as Sri Lanka (at least, Sir Arthur never complained).
Those blue *par avion * stickers used to be on the counters at post offices here, but I haven’t seen them, nor have I used one, for a number of years. I’d guess that all overseas mail goes via air nowadays, so there’s no need for them.
The USPS prints Air Mail/Par Avion on the online customs forms and shipping labels (Click N Ship) for Priority Mail International and Express Mail International
I also notice that all the international boxes they provide say Air Mail/Par Avion on them as well.
The air mail designation that was once used was eliminated. First-Class Mail® International is now the proper designation for letters. As far as I know, no such thing as “air mail” exists in US postage.
Before the change I put the par avion stickers on each piece of air mail. I was given a block of them as thick as a brick at one point and even sending out hundreds each year for years never used them up.
However, since the new rules I was told explicitly not to use them any longer.
The postage should be enough to tell the sorting machines what class of delivery is being used. The U.S. now has six classes:
Global Express Guaranteed®
Express Mail® International
Express Mail® Flat Rate Envelope
Priority Mail® International
Priority Mail® Flat Rate Envelope
First-Class Mail® International
I don’t see at the international rate calculator any way to send even a package by surface, but I did get asked if I wanted to do so at the post office this week, so some vestige of that form must still exist.
That’s been my experience too. They stamp it when I tell them it’s going overseas. They usually go nuts on the stamp too… they’ll stamp it all over the front. That makes me think it’s just so that if someone sees it laying in a pile, they pay attention to it.
The real romance was when they had a 1/2 oz rate for air mail. Now there’s not really any special motivation to use airmail envelopes and paper unless you’re writing a lot.
Incidentally, ‘etiquette’ is the French word commonly used for ‘tag’ or ‘label’, which fits neatly with French being the international postal language, according to your link.
And you could special lightweight paper, looked like blue tissue, to write on. You’d have to fit your letter in on all the flaps, fold them up with a blank side left for the address, and it would get across the ocean by piston power in only a few days or so … Damn, I’m old.
Hell, not that old, I hope. I used to buy airmail pads to write to my cousin in New Castle, PA. But I never used one of those clever foldy things, just the tissue paper and blue envelopes.
He sent me a chunk of raccoon fur and a huge pile of baseball cards. I suspect he didn’t put those in a red and blue envelope, but they were sent air mail all the same.
Thanks for the replies, all. It sounds to me like the blue stickers we put on the letters yesterday were not necessary, and the letters will be handled no differently than they would have without them (First-Class Mail International). A couple of years ago, maybe not.
It does seem rather odd that one would have had to (in the past, in the US) specifically indicated - essentially - “Not By Slow Boat” on a letter even when sufficient postage for faster transport was applied.
However, if the various threads around here have taught me anything, it’s that the postal industry is full of strange quirks and historical ways of doing things that may make little sense to outsiders.
Aerogrammes, they’re called. We used to get them by the dozen, since we had many relatives overseas. I’m pretty sure you can still buy them at the post office.