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In the city I live in there is a large post office where I normally send my mail off with. I've never sent out of the country before but I want to now, I was asking the person in the post office if they sell IRCs she said she hadn't even heard of them. It would mean going to another city and still not being certain they will have them.

I was wondering if it would be ok to send a sae and put on it 'reciever to pay postage'. Would this work? Has anyone tried it before?

Hi *Tasha*,

The same thing happened to me when I first started using IRCs. The man had no idea what I was talking about so I explained to him what they were. He went and got a little handbook and foundout what they were but said he didn't think they had any. He went and checked and it turned out they did, just a very small supply. Sometimes they can order some for you if you ask. Otherwise I would just write in your letter that you can't get ahold of any foriegn postage. Or you could try to buy some postage from the country you were going to send to. I don't know about putting 'Reciever to pay postage' on the envelope. I think there is a way to do that, but I don't know how to do it. If the post office can't order any IRCs for you I would just include a SAE and explain at the end of the letter that you couldn't get the postage and would they mind paying. If they did I would send a short thank you note for both sending the signiture and paying postage.

Hi *Tasha*

Some staff members at post offices don't know what IRC's are, mainly because they may not have sold one ever. They're not the most popular item to sell, and many people probably don't know that they even exist.

Like starreyes said, you should probably try to go back and explain what an IRC is. Remember to say "International Reply Coupon" as they may not understand what an IRC is. Once the staff member works out what they are, if they don't have any then ask them to order some in for you.

If you can however, try to get some stamps from the country you're sending to. Obviously, it's preferable to send a SASE/SAE & IRC's as it can increase your chance of receiving a reply.

As for 'receiver to pay postage' - you run the risk that the post office will refuse to post the letter back to you. This may result in you not receiving successes when you should have. I think it is possible to do so, but picking up the package from the post office and paying for postage may cost you more than sending IRC's for your SAE.

nowandagain [rockon]

nowandagain wrote:As for 'receiver to pay postage' - you run the risk that the post office will refuse to post the letter back to you. This may result in you not receiving successes when you should have. I think it is possible to do so, but picking up the package from the post office and paying for postage may cost you more than sending IRC's for your SAE.

Just another thought, if you were going to try to pick it up from the post office and pay for the postage then you might want to go to the post office ahead of time and find out what this would involve. That way you know ahead of time what you are getting into.

Personally, I think the stamps/IRC would be much simpler.

We are in the same situation like you and we have to go in car at 40 minutes of our town and so we can buy it.
It´s horrible! ¬¬

*Tasha* wrote:
I was wondering if it would be ok to send a sae and put on it 'reciever to pay postage'. Would this work? Has anyone tried it before?

Hi,

I have done this once and I got it back But the "problem" was that I never had to pay anything for it!! No bills were attached! So when sending as "Receiver will pay for postage" you should always contact the postoffice as different countries have different procedures for this and make sure you will actually receive your replies

Good luck!

Fatima xxx