Change of Overprint and New Post and Go Stamps at The Postal Museum
LONDON, 16 August 2017 –
The Postal Museum has announced today
that its ‘Official Opening’ inscription will end on all designs on
Tuesday 12 September. It will be replaced with the words ‘The Postal
Museum’ (without the organisation’s envelope logo)
across all designs the following day, Wednesday 13 September.
Coinciding with the
first day of Stampex, there will also be changes to the designs
available from The Postal Museum’s A0001 machine. Royal Mail Heritage:
Mail by Air (six designs – first class only) will
replace the Union Flag (all values), which will no longer be available.
The following stamps will be on sale from Wednesday 13 September:
- Royal Mail Heritage: Mail by Air (six designs – first class only)
- Machin 50 Commemoratives (six designs - 1st class only)
- Machin (2nd Class only)
- Underground Railway (all values)
- Mail Coach (all values)
Inscription Errors for Guernsey Visiting Liners
GM from Jersey writes:
The uptake on the current visiting cruise ship issues from Guernsey has not been great. My agent over there has picked up errors in the spelling of the ships names, most recently Sliver Spirit instead of Silver Spirit, which was spotted and corrected on the day. [See below §]
He also writes about various errors on Jersey Post and Go stamps, including
-
combinations of blank and correct printings
-
Battle of Hastings underprint with sword but no descriptive lettering.
-
half printed underprint lettering due to slipping within the roll of stamps
-
error, underprint RAFA on endangered species issues.
Is Post and Go worthwhile for Jersey? Apparently only if collectors buy the stamps, as GM also reports:
JE02 is very little used except by me. For example I have experienced the session numbers increase by only 1 or 2 over a period of 10 days!
For more on the dubious output of Jersey's Philatelic Bureau and that of the Isle of Man, take a look at the Commonwealth Stamps Opinion Blog.
§ I've had a response from the Head of Philatelic at Guernsey Post in response to the comments.
a. The error of Sliver for Silver is the only error that has been reported and was corrected on the same day.
b. "the uptake among the audience for which the products were primarily intended - cruise ship passengers - were healthy and we are delighted to have supported the Visit Guernsey initiative by offering Post & Go products to passengers"I'm happy to publish this response from Guernsey.
The National Museum of the Royal Navy
Kiosk A002 in Portsmouth will have the following inscriptions starting Saturday 19 August and ending 18 September to celebrate the arrival of the HMS Queen Elizabeth in Portsmouth.
Union Flag
Royal Navy
QEII Carrier 2017
Machin
Royal Navy
Queen Elizabeth II Carrier 2017
These stamps can only be obtained from the Museum.
UPDATE: Thanks to Chris for sending these images:
UPDATE:
As noted by the anonymous contributor, the inscription on these is incorrect as the carrier is actually HMS Queen Elizabeth - don't be surprised if there are changes here!
UPDATE 25 August
We have now been told that the inscriptions have changed to correct this error: I'm trying to find out when it changed. But it was not changed until 1020 on 29 August!
Thanks to Chris H we can now show the stamps with the corrected inscription and receipt:
As before, we will not be stocking these Post and Go stamps. An announcement about Autumn Stampex will be made shortly.
Another interesting Post & Go 'cock up'... the carrier, as you correctly note is HMS Queen Elizabeth, yet the stamps refer to Queen Elizabeth II. When and where will this all end? Dave
ReplyDeleteThe Postal Museum stamps would all seem to be new which seems a bit overdoing it
ReplyDeleteJohn Embrey
Who in their right mind would consider an overprint referring to a Royal Navy Ship as, QEII Carrier on the Union Flag and Queen Elizabeth II Carrier on the Machin. Do the idiots who decided this ridiculous Overprint consult with anyone before deciding the text. As with producing First Day Covers, once you print it's impossible to change/go back. Are these Post & Go idiots ever going to do things correctly or properly, they seem oblivious to any sanctions from the Royal Mail, not least being disciplined or sacked. The proud name of Queen Elizabeth has been tarnished by this highly offensive overprint. HMS Queen Elizabeth is a magnificent piece of British history and engineering, not least the largest Warship ever built for the Royal Navy in hundreds of years of Royal Navy history and shipbuilding and named after our even greater magnificent Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II who has served our Country with distinction for over 60 years. Queen Elizabeth II is a Luxury Liner and why the bafoons who decided this overprint would in past years have been bundled off to the Tower. I suspect the lack of HMS is due to Crown Copyright and the correct permissions should have been sought for this Historic Event, they have actually been building this Ship almost since the Post & Go mainstream of Issues started, not much time to sort things out properly then!!! Where is the correct quality control with these Post & Go Issues, and here have been dozens and dozens of errors since there inception, some have said the Errors/mistakes have been Domenic on purpose to increase sales, as they do generally by putting in different MA Year reels for each event to increase sales. They seem a law unto themselves with little re-course or discipline from anyone. Where and when will this all end, they have become a laughing stock to some serious collectors. I wonder what Rolland Hill and Arnold Machin might say about the Post & Go organisers in Portishead near Bristol!!!
ReplyDeleteYes, as you say, quality control is important, but we all make mistakes sometimes. For example from above, bafoons should be spelt buffoons and re-course has no hyphen. The phrase *since there inception* should have the possessive *their* and why the capitalisation for Warship, Country, Historic Event and Ship? Always best to check before you publish.
DeleteTrelantis, thank you for coming in where I despaired to tread!
DeleteAs for the Queen Elizabeth II error, I don't know who thought of the new inscription but I understand that this wording was cleared with the Museum. Now whether that was with the supervisor of the museum shop or the museum top brass I don't know, but clearly there were mistakes made. The absence of HMS is not unusual: there isn't much space and Crown Copyright doesn't come into it.
Oh, and while I think of it, the luxury liner is actually Queen Elizabeth 2, not II. 'Domenic' is a given name, so I don't know what was intended here, and ROLLAND hill would be ROWLING in his grave at this comment.
But let's not get hung up about grammar; despite his verbosity Anonymous does make an interesting point: the basic error on the NMRN stamps should not have been made.
The updated version to the overprint was made today 29/08/2017 at 1020 hrs. So no advance warning to collectors wanting a first day of issue.
Deletehttp://iarroyalmailpostandgo.com/latestnews/nmrn-request-amendment-a002-overprint/
Coinciding with your comment, an email from Tallents House showing the revised inscriptions, on the screen.
DeleteI see the revised overprint for the new aircraft carrier has now been put on to the Post & Go machine at Portsmouth but it looks like it is still incorrect. According to IAR website it now reads Queen Elizabeth Carrier but should it not be the HMS Queen Elizabeth Carrier?
DeleteOmission of HMS is permissible. The Victory is in Portsmouth Dockyard - yes, it's HMS Victory, but 'The Victory' or 'he was on board Victory when he was shot' is acceptable.
DeleteI agree that for a formal inscription such as this it would have been better but there is only so much space available.
The 2017 date could have been left off as I am sure most people must have read about it or seen it on the news. Anyway the date is in the line at the bottom of the stamp.
DeleteYes: I failed to spot that they had added the year; quite unnecessary, so they could have added HMS. I wonder if they will still be producing them when the Prince of Wales carrier arrives in a few years' time?
DeleteHi Ian
DeleteDo you have the link to the NMRN website where they are for sale? I searched and couldn't find it. Thanks.
I have to question if anyone involved with Post & Go Overprints is sufficiently well organised to create deliberate errors. The Scottish Congress errors were not publicised so they did not create any extra sales. I was told there were only 10 pre-orders for this year's Congress.
ReplyDeleteThere is no publicity for Year Codes so it is difficult to generate extra sales. Whilst they may well be spotted at STAMPEX they are much less likely to be spotted at Museum sites unless a collector/dealer happens to live locally.
Other than a few Post & Go "geeks" I suspect there is very little interest in this degree of detail.
John Embrey
John, I share your assumption that the errors are just that, and not contrived. Frustrating, sloppy QA and recently poorly set out on the P&G stamps, but non-intentional I'm sure. Regarding your comments on the year codes, I think it a bit disingenuous to refer to collectors of these as geeks. I'm aware of quite a few collectors of these variants and see no real difference to the year and source codes on security Machins, and variations on watermarks, perforations etc elsewhere. All of these have been extensively studied and catalogued and form the basis of specialised collecting. This is just a another area for specialised collecting, if that is one's desire and interest.
DeleteThis may be relevant, from one of the very earliest posts about RMRN:
DeleteAlthough the regular issues are on the Museum shop website, the short-term specials will only be available in person or by telephone 02392 727596 or possibly email: shop@nmrn.org.uk They are taking advance orders, but take particular note of the following:
The price shown on the Museum website is £15 for a Collectors Strip.