How late is your Christmas Card

[Spartacus]

Its that time of year again, past Christmas day and late delayed cards are turning up.

How late are your cards arriving ? 

Last year I had one delivered 4 weeks late.

Can that be beaten this year ? 

[Sue]

2 hours ago, Spartacus said:

Last year I had one delivered 4 weeks late.

But when was it posted?!

I haven't posted any this year. I can't bring myself to pay the exorbitant cost of the stamps, and at least I can sort of honestly blame it on illness.

If I can't hand deliver them, I send e-cards.

I know it's not the same, but it's very much easier.

And as for the people who still send pages of closely handwritten letters .... very admirable in terms of the hours it must have taken them to write them,  but they remind me of those spoofs eg x has just passed all their many important exams with the highest marks possible, y has just walked round the world in a week, z has just become the first person ever to be knighted twice, we are about to fly off for our fifteenth exotic holiday this year .......

Or else (or sometimes and) they are full of who has had what illnesses and accidents and other catastrophes.

Is this just my relatives and distant friends? Am I somehow attracting these reams of handwritten paper?

Edited Monday at 15:17 by Sue

[Cancerian]

Suppose it depends on how many Christmas cards from family and friends you’re waiting to receive. It’s been the Christmas period so surely give the post delivery service some leeway. Like Sue I’ve not posted off so many this year but some I still write letters to  e.g my late mum’s cousins and other family  but hey ho that’s something I do and enjoy. 
I used to hand deliver Christmas cards to a lot of neighbours on my street but gave up this year as realised that most of them I don’t see or speak to and can only count on a few to call a true friend or neighbour. 

[malumbu]

Two subjects here.  Xmas cards,  We receive and send less of them.  One reason is that the cost of postage - although interestingly not as much as I thought say compared to 10 years ago (a little more than inflation).  Fun fact when inflation was double digits in the 70s cost of postage almost doubled in one year.  Postage is not a good indication of general inflation fluctuating a fair bit.  The huge rise in international postage that for a 20g Christmas card to Europe (no longer a 20g price, now have to do up to 100g), or a cheapskate 10g card to the 'States (again have to go up to the 100g price) , both around a quid in 2015, and now has more than doubled in real terms.  Cards exchanged with the US last year were arriving in the New Year.  Funnily enough they came much quicker this year.  So all my cards abroad were by email this year.

The other reason we send less cards is that it was once a good opportunity to keep in touch with news.  I still personalise many cards with a news and for some a letter, and am a bit grumpy when I get a single line back,  Or worse a round robin about their perfect lives and families.  But most of us now communicate I expect primarily by WhatApp, email, FB etc.  No need for lightweight airmail envelope and paper in one.   

The other subject is the mail as a whole. Privitisation appears to have done it no favours and the opening up of competition with restrictions on competing for parcel post with the new entrants.  Clearly unless you do special delivery there is a good chance that first class will not be delivered in a day as was expected in the past.   Should we have kept a public owned service subsidised by the tax payer?  You could also question how much lead on innovation was lost following the hiving off of the national telecommunications and mail network.

[Spartacus]

29 minutes ago, malumbu said:

Or worse a round robin about their perfect lives and families.    

These have reduced over the years, are "perfect" lives Round Robins being replaced by "perfect" lives Instagram posts where we see all year round how people portray their perfect lives ? 

 

The point of this thread is that for the last few years, due to issues at the mail offices, we had delays to post over Christmas. Not really been flagged as an issue this year but I am still betting on the odd card, posted well before Christmas, arriving late January. 

[malumbu]

Post much better this Xmas.  Sue posted about whether they send Xmas cards; how good the post is,  is relevant. 

Think I will continue to stay off Instagram!

Edited yesterday at 14:30 by malumbu

[Pugwash]

Posted around 12 cards 2 weeks prior to 24th December. Had some responses so know people have received them. Had about 20 cards - mixture of hand delivered and via post. After years of 'nagging' by myself and our daughters, we may have cured hubby of spending £4 plus on individual cards for our immediate family  ( when you have 12 immediate family it costs a bomb) Also as the girls state, they get put in the recycling bad at beginning of January regardless of cost.

[Sue]

11 hours ago, Pugwash said:

Posted around 12 cards 2 weeks prior to 24th December. Had some responses so know people have received them. Had about 20 cards - mixture of hand delivered and via post. After years of 'nagging' by myself and our daughters, we may have cured hubby of spending £4 plus on individual cards for our immediate family  ( when you have 12 immediate family it costs a bomb) Also as the girls state, they get put in the recycling bad at beginning of January regardless of cost.

Crikey, £4 plus does seem excessive for one card, let alone twelve at that price!

Did he explain why he wanted to spend so much? There could be many reasons.

Did the recipients also send expensive cards? If so, rather than putting them in the recycling bin, you could just cut the handwritten bit off and send them to a different relative the following Christmas!