Hi everyone!
June is (finally!) here, which means school is soon going to be out for the summer in the northern hemisphere. Since this is the time when many postcrossers take their yearly holidays, we just wanted to remind everyone that the inactive status is here to help!
If you have holidays coming up, or you know you’re going to be away from your home or school address for a while, we recommend that you switch your account to inactive a few weeks in advance. When you set your account to inactive (which you can easily do by editing your account settings), Postcrossing does not to give your address to any other members while you are away. You can still send postcards if you’d like, but you won’t be sent any until you’re ready to receive them.
When you’re back, all you need to do is to switch your account back to active and you’ll be in business again! Rest assured, all your due postcards will then be sent your way.
Enjoy your holidays, and be sure to stock on nice postcards! :)
12 comments so far
I wish more postcrosser would use this inactive button, so there are not so many expired postcards just because people have stopped or are on holiday.
@akalle We try! We put this post up + mail everyone about it once a year, and also automatically set accounts to inactive when they don't log in for a while... but sometimes it's not enough.
Feel free to pass the information along on other groups you might be in, and to newbies as well! :)
Thank you so much for the reminder. - Happy Holidays -
Wish I COULD go on vacation. Instead, I will rely on friendly postcrossers to take me on virtual vacations!
Postcrossing cards in my mailbox are my vacation!
Oh, how I wish people would do this!
I wished the people would have done it last December,when we German postcrossers wrote for charity. Took so long for some postcards to get registered that I sent fewer than the year before, although I had more postcards allowed to travel at the same time.
I have another case. I'm a newpostcrosser. Since April I've sent 7 cards and another 6 my cards are traveling now. I've been being at home and received no cards. It's sad. Maybe somebody thinks I went on vacation and forgot to inactivate my account, but I'm home and waiting impatiently for your card.
May I offer some comment? For sure some postcrossers register some cards late because they are away on holiday or for another reason, but I daresay this is finally rare and so far when it did happen to my cards, there was a kind and thoughtful apology explaining why the delay. As I usually resend after 3 months when a card is not registered, the cards really lost get registered on my second attempt. The others sadly remain unregistered and my e-mails about them unanswered???? No comments.
On the other hand I wish to say that the international postal service is terribly erratic, not always the same countries are affected but between last November and March, postcards to/from Germany for instance were very slow (up to 2 months), same with France (even longer delays) while with the UK it was 12-15 days. Currently there are very long travelling times for part of the cards to/from Germany, most cards to/from Canada and if cards from Russia do reach me more or less "quickly", those I send to Russia never seem to arrive, except for very few.
All that said, I think it is a great idea to encourage postcrossers to go inactive when they are away from their mailbox, but for countries with long travelling times, that would mean to know about one's absence months before.....
I agree with the previous comment! I'm from Russia and our postal service is very slowly. According to Postcrossing's statistics I receive postcards after traveling month and more. Within my country it may be week or two, but not for sure. For example one of my friends in Russia received my New Year card (sent in the end of December) in February! A month and a half within one country! I can't understand it, but I have to live with it. So OK, I've set my account inactive month before vacation, but I'm sure that some of now traveling postcards will be received after my return.
Yes,please do it because currently my cards travel suspiciously slow and long... There are unfair people unfortunately...
For complaining I recommend you to use the forum. A perfect place for all complains and compliments.