Do Not Mail List
November 14, 2007 9:05 PM   Subscribe

How do I stop paper junk mail? Is there an equivalent of the government Do Not Call List for regular mail?
posted by destro to Work & Money (21 answers total) 37 users marked this as a favorite
 
Best answer: When I googled "stop junk mail" I got this.
posted by purenitrous at 9:06 PM on November 14, 2007


Best answer: National Do Not Mail List.
posted by ottereroticist at 9:08 PM on November 14, 2007


Best answer: And this: http://www.41pounds.org/
posted by cdmwebs at 9:11 PM on November 14, 2007


Take a look at www.catalogchoice.org -

"...you can remove your name from the mailing lists of over 600 catalogs... Over time, the service expects to have thousands of catalogs listed in its database."

I have a note on my mailbox that reads No Circulars, No Fliers Please, and it probably works about 50% of the time.
posted by Nathanial Hörnblowér at 9:11 PM on November 14, 2007


Best answer: This page has info on how to stop those credit card offers. I did it through the optoutprescreen website, works wonders. Haven't gotten a single credit card offer since! (Previously, had at LEAST five per week)
posted by Xere at 9:14 PM on November 14, 2007


Link.
posted by kingjoeshmoe at 9:15 PM on November 14, 2007


HERE is the OFFICIAL website for opting-out of pre-screened offers from the following credit reporting agencies (CRAs):

Equifax
Experian
Innovis
TransUnion

My wife and I haven't gotten a piece of junk mail for years.
posted by Mr_Crazyhorse at 9:18 PM on November 14, 2007 [3 favorites]


Catalogchoice is a nice idea, but doesn't actually work; as far as I can tell they're just hoping that merchants will voluntarily stop sending catalogs to the people listed in their database. Which, yeah, right, that'll happen.
posted by ook at 9:19 PM on November 14, 2007


note:

of all these links, the ONLY legitimate one is optoutprescreen.com

the rest are either useless, ripoffs, charge a fee or some combination thereof.
posted by Mr_Crazyhorse at 9:20 PM on November 14, 2007


Green Dimes (I have not used this service).

After I called my credit card company directly and told them to take me off their marketing lists, I noticed a significant decrease in junk mail.
posted by hooray at 9:31 PM on November 14, 2007


I have a note on my mailbox that reads No Circulars, No Fliers Please, and it probably works about 50% of the time.

Please have yourself removed from mailing lists rather than do this. As for the fliers and circulars, all this means is that your letter carrier has to take a moment every day to remember that you're the customer with the special note on his/her mailbox. Mail carriers often have upward of 500 customers on their routes - imagine if we all made special requests about what kind of mail we do/don't want to receive. Delivering mail is HARD work (despite general, uninformed opinions to the contrary), and every customer who throws a monkey wrench into this backbreaking job causes yet more work for already overworked carriers. Go deeper than the U.S. Postal Service in your attempts to stem the tidal wave of junk mail. Get as close to the root of the problem as you can.

This recent story on American Public Media's Marketplace included recommendations for these two sites:

How To Get Off a Mailing List

Getting Anonymous
posted by splendid animal at 9:41 PM on November 14, 2007


Unfortunately, there is no direct equivalent of the "Do not Call" list. That was established by an act of Congress, and telemarketers who call a number on that list can be fined.

SCOTUS has decided that junk mail is covered by the First Amendment, so there can be no equivalent list for junk mail, to be enforced by threat of fines.

The "Do not Mail" list given above is an industry thing, but compliance is voluntary. Many junkmailers ignore it.

Putting a "no junkmail" tag on your mailbox is pointless because it's against the law for postal workers to refuse to deliver junk mail. Postage was paid, and they are required to deliver it.
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 10:02 PM on November 14, 2007


Putting a "no junkmail" tag on your mailbox is pointless because it's against the law for postal workers to refuse to deliver junk mail. Postage was paid, and they are required to deliver it.

True.
posted by splendid animal at 10:05 PM on November 14, 2007


I used the optoutprescreen site, and it worked.
posted by number9dream at 10:11 PM on November 14, 2007


In case it hasn't been made clear, you marked the wrong best answers. Mr_Crazyhorse has it.
posted by knave at 10:33 PM on November 14, 2007


Steven's point is only true where the junk mail is posted. Here in Australia, the vast majority of junk mail is delivered by private companies. The biggest of these is Salmat. When I was a kid I delivered for them, and they did spot-checks on the routes -- if you put junk in boxes marked "No junk mail" or "Addressed mail only" or "Australia Post only", you got your pay docked. So those labels work.
posted by robcorr at 11:01 PM on November 14, 2007


I've used Greendimes for the last year or so and it seems to have worked pretty well. I just have to get myself off the dumb catalog lists from companies I actually bought something from.
posted by mathowie at 11:46 PM on November 14, 2007


See also
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 8:59 AM on November 15, 2007


Note that (in the US) a lot of the advertising junk mail (like the stuff on newsprint from Safeway) is mailed second or third class, which isn't covered by the opt-out schemes mentioned above.
posted by Rash at 9:41 AM on November 15, 2007


Optoutprescreen.com is legit... I used it, and it took a few weeks to kick in, but now I never get credit card offers.

Anything that is addressed to "resident" or "our neighbor" or anything like that is virtually impossible to stop receiving. These companies are paying a dirt cheap rate to spam every single address in your zip code, and you can't really get off their lists.
posted by stilly at 10:26 AM on November 15, 2007


I did the opt out on the Direct Mail link above, but it really only helped a little, and it doesn't get rid of credit card offers, which are the bulk of our junk mail. I do opt out on everything I sign up for; nothing helps.
posted by nax at 3:58 PM on November 15, 2007


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