Always look carefully before you bin it!

I was recently asked to dispose of somebody's incoming papers securely - shredding, burning etc.  Not a problem, and something most of us do.  Included were some of the original envelopes, so of course I did look closely at the stamps.

This one was a nice surprise, and I had to double check in our own Checklist to find out whether it was 'new' or previously recorded - there are so many Machins now that I can't remember which ones we've had (ie most of the counter sheets, business sheets and booklets) and which we haven't (eg the coils). 

It's ordinary commercial mail, until you look closely.  The address is actually not written as it appears (even more so when you can see all of it), but ink-jet printed.  And this is the 1st class stamp.

And of course we have had the vermillion M13L MRIL coil stamp before.  It was first found by us on mail from the Equiniti Share Administration Service (who handle, amongst other things employee, holdings in Royal Mail shares). 


Although not philatelic, that one was closely linked to Royal Mail, so it was nice to find this one from a totally different source.   This is believed to have been posted on behalf of Magdalen College School in Oxford, although we don't know whether a direct mail house was involved (seems likely), or whether they bought the stamps direct from Royal Mail.

Unusually, although produced in coils of 10,000, this was available to collectors and others from Royal Mail from 31 July 2014.  This and the 2nd class were printed by ISP Walsall with numbers on the back of every fifth stamp.

So remember - look before you clip or tear the stamps to dump into kiloware.  The first one sold on eBay raised £51, and these first class coil stamps will always be scarce on commercial cover.  And if you have any other examples that you would like to share, please send them to me at the email address above (right).

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Some they catch, some they don't - modern forgeries

Long-term Machin collectors - especially members of the Modern British Philatelic Circle - will be aware that a number of forgeries have been prepared over the years, from the early and poor-quality 24p brown, through to modern 1st class (or even £1) stamps. 

It must be improving print technology and lower prices for equipment and materials has led to a proliferation of quite good-quality forgeries of the 1st class red with security features!  The one thing that eludes all the forgers is to properly reproduce the phosphorescent ink.

Quite often these forgeries pass through the mail system without difficulty, but I have now been shown an example which was picked up by the automatic sorting equipment, and not cancelled.  Upon examination it was first cancelled with the wavy line handstamp now (not often enough) used instead of the good old ball-point pen, and then the stamp was identified as a wrong 'un.  I've not seen this COUNTERFEIT STAMP handstamp before. Being unpaid, the new £2 standard charge for an unpaid letter was raised, with the yellow sticker applied.

I don't know how old this is.  The stamp coding is MTIL M13L which means it could be nearly 4 years old - or it could have been used late last year.

UPDATE: Rob has identified the competition (correctly) from the limited amount of address shown; it was published on August 28 2016, so the entry would have been posted within a few days of that date.

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New Catalogue Machin Security Definitive Stamps

We are pleased to announce that the new Norvic Checklist of Machin Security Definitive Stamps is now available free of charge to all collectors and dealers.

Designed to fit the gap between the Stanley Gibbons GB Concise Catalogue and the extreme detail of some other lists, this identifies all the values with all the source and year codes, cross-referenced to SG numbers and Royal Mail product codes.  Source booklet numbers are also included to assist in precise identification.

Table showing 2nd class counter sheet listing

Dates of issue or earliest known dates (EKD) of appearance are shown.  Over the summer the list has been checked by a number of customers and dealers, and many corrections made, but more information is waiting to be discovered, especially on dates.  Checking stamps on ordinary mail may yet reveal that stamps were actually in post offices or other retail outlets earlier than previously thought so the list is always subject to change.  But it is totally up to date with the latest discovery, the 2p M14L (see below).

Some collectors (and dealers) record these stamps in greater detail than we do, for instance according to the size of the gap in the security slits, according to the shape of the perforation, or the direction of printing.  This doesn't claim to be a complete list of Security Machins according to those criteria, but it does list all the basic stamps - and a few extras.

The Norvic numbers are used in our webshop, and we hope that this will help customers to find what they are looking for an fill the gaps.  

To download a copy of the checklist go to Dropbox.

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Surprise new 1st class coil stamp now distributed by Royal Mail.

The 2013 printing of the 1st class red self-adhesive coil first seen on mailings from Royal Mail's share registrar and reported here has now been made available mint, along with a new version of the 2012 2nd class coil.  Both are printed by Walsall Security Print, and both are numbered on the reverse.  

The original 2nd class coil was printed by Enschede, coded MA12, and numbered.  Then a Walsall printing coded M12L was discovered, which had no numbering on the reverse. On our initial supplies of the 1st class, the iridescent printing is inset at the left.

The 2nd class coil, showing unnumbered and numbered strips of 10.  We have two unnumbered strips remaining in stock.   The 1st class coil and strips are also listed in our shop.

Royal Mail have distributed these because of the new printer, as 'non-visible changes'.  This seems to be a new policy as previously stamps distributed as a result of a printer change have been 'visible changes' in counter sheets (where the cylinder number indicates the printer but the individual stamps are no different).  When Business Sheet printing moved to a new printer, the sheets were not identified by Royal Mail as different and were not available as a separate stock item.

Thanks to all the readers who emailed, phoned, and left blog comments about this surprise distribution.  I wanted to see them for myself before writing anything which might then have to be edited.

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Surprise new 1st class M13L coil found

Investor alert!  No this is not about investing in stamps but a call to those who invested in Royal Mail shares.  One of our correspondents reports receiving a communication from Equiniti about the share dividend, with an unexpected new stamp:

Yes, it's the 1st class MRIL coil with M13L code.  The previous red coil stamp distributed with the palette change issue (3 January 2013) was coded MA12.  This new stamp is numbered 2914R.3 in our system.  If we get mint stocks, we will let you know!

UPDATE 12 JUNE: I'm pleased to say that our letters arrived today (but the extra one is already reserved).

UPDATE 18 JUNE: The first of these (to my knowledge) has now appeared on eBay, closed 21 June at £51plus 53p postage - see here.

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Welsh Railways stamp issue in 2014 will be expensive

The last of the Classic Locomotives miniature sheets will be issued on 20 February 2014 at Spring Stampex, but there will be no self-adhesive retail booklet at this time.  Instead a Prestige Stamp Book will be available, which will include stamps from all four miniature sheet issues.

The final set includes some classics of the Welsh railways in their prime, including narrow gauge locomotives.

Locomotives depicted are (according to information received from Royal Mail):

1st/af class LMS No. 7720 – FR Hebron © Rail Archive Stephenson ***
78p Hunslet No. 589 Blanche © Geoff Plumb (Ffestiniog Railway)
88p Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway No. 822 The Earl – PM Alexander © Michael Whitehouse
£1.28 British Railways 5600 No. 5652 – TB Owen © Colour-Rail;
Background image BR 5101 2-6-2T No. 4126 – AED Collection © Prorail UK

*** UPDATE 6 February.
An eagle-eyed reader has noticed that on these images the 1st class Welsh loco has a different caption on the miniature sheet (LMS 2F No. 7720) to that on the PSB pane.  Having examined the actual stamps I can confirm that in both cases the caption is LMS No. 7720.  Some of the earlier stamps included the locomotive class, (7720 is a class 2F) but the Wales stamps do NOT include the class. 

The Prestige Book contains 4 panes of locomotives, one for each country containing the 1st class and next value from the original miniature sheets, and one definitive pane containing 4 country definitives and four Machin definitives - 2 at 2p and 2 at 5p.  Once again Royal Mail have failed to appreciate that Machin collectors who want only these on first day covers must add an additional 53p of postage to meet the 1st class postage rate normally needed. The panes are shown here with the cover.  Click on the image to see larger versions.  Retail price £13.97

Front cover and Definitive pane

England and Scotland

Northern Ireland and Wales

Technical details as provided by Royal Mail  (subject to change):
Miniature sheet - printed in litho by International Security Printers
Prestige Book - printed by Joh Enschede in litho.

UPDATE 28 JAN 14
We now have the PSB panes and can show the definitives, which are coded M13L MPIL.  This is much more difficult to see than on earlier panes by other printers, and not even as easy to see as on the Enschede-printed Merchant Navy pane.

The reproduction of the Country definitives is very similar to that in the Football Heroes PSB, but the phosphor is more visible on those with a yellowish tinge. In the pictures below, the Football Heroes stamps are on the left and the UK Locomotives on the right.

(Stray marks are not flaws, but some extraneous fibres in the scans, from the carrier card. )

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Stampex Faststamps and new Machins now on sale in our shop

Most pre-orders have now been cleared so we have added the following to our e-commerce site - but we didn't buy hundreds of each, so get them now while you can.  For some Faststamps we have only 3-4 examples.  Click on the heading to straight to the shop

Machin Definitives:
5p and 50p Merchant Navy from prestige book M13L
2nd Large from business sheets MA13
2nd Large from booklets MA13
10p counter sheet including cylinder blocks
1st and 1st Large counter sheets MA13

British Auto Legends Maximum Cards - all 10 listed here

Post and Go Faststamps:
Freshwater Life 3: Rivers Hytech sets of 36 and 6 x 1st
Union Flag with Coronation inscription (MA13) - collectors sets of 6 and 1st class, both from FIVE different machines
Machin MA13 no added inscription - collectors sets of 6 and 1st class, both from FOUR different machines

First Day Covers for some of these will be added when received from postmarking centres.

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Merchant Navy stamps update

We are now able to show some scans of the actual booklet, and especially the Machin stamps from this issue; more have been added to the original blogpost.

5p & 50p Machin definitives from prestige stamp book with iridescent text showing M13L MPIL as expected.

Comparison of 5p from prestige books.  On the left, the Walsall printing from the Footballers PSB.  On the right, the Enschede printing from the Merchant Navy PSB. Of course the perforations make them easy to identify but there would have been plenty of other characteristics to look for had Enschede set the perforator in the conventional way.

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After 10 months, how many Machin stamps so far this year?

Write your guess down before you read further!  It isn't a competition, only with yourself.  

So....  in January the 1st class stamp turned red, but had 2012 codes because they were contracted last year.  Some 2013 reprints have appeared.  Then there were new postage rates, with 3 of the 5 stamps printed by two printers, and some rates were unchanged and the relevant stamps have also been reprinted.  And we've had three prestige stamp books with Machin definitives in.

I've been a bit slack in keeping this updated, so additions in blue are since the last update.

Ok here's the list, with links to either our website or where they were reported on this blog:

3 January 2013 **
1. 1st class red - counter sheets - M12L MAIL
2. 1st class red - business sheets - M12L MBIL
3. 1st class red - boooklet of 12 - M12L MTIL
4. 1st class red - booklet of 6 - M12L MSIL
5. 1st class Large red - counter sheet - MA12 MAIL
6. 1st class Large red - business sheet - MA12 MBIL
7. 1st class Large red - booklet of 4 - MA12 MFIL
8. 1p maroon - counter sheets - M12L MAIL
9. 2p dark green - counter sheets - M12L MAIL
10. 5p ash pink - counter sheets - M12L MAIL
11. 10p orange-brown - counter sheets - M12L MAIL
12. 20p emerald green  - counter sheets - M12L MAIL
13. 50p slate-grey - counter sheets - M12L MAIL
14. £1 wood brown - counter sheets - M12L MAIL

9 Janaury 2013  London Underground
15. 1st class red - mixed retail booklet of 6 - M12L MCIL

12 February 2013 blog
16. 1st class red - booklet of 6 - M13L MSIL

2 March 2013 blog
17. 2nd class blue  - booklet of 12 - M13L MTIL

26 March 2013 - Dr Who PSB
18.  5p ash pink - M12L MPIL
19. 10p orange-brown - M12L MPIL
20. 20p emerald green - M12L MPIL
21. 87p orange - M12L MPIL


27 March 2013 - new postage rates (see also blog entry at 9 April below)
22. 78p Walsall SP printing M13L
23. 88p Walsall SP printing M13L
24. £1.88 Walsall SP printing M13L
25. 1st Royal Mail Signed For De La Rue printing MA13
26. 1st Large Royal Mail Signed For De La Rue printing MA13

9 April 2013 blog
27. 78p new postage rates De La Rue printing MA13 (* only in presentation packs and FDCs) - now available in sheets.
28. 88p new postage rates De La Rue printing MA13
29. £1.88 new postage rates De La Rue printing MA13

15 April 2013 blog
30. 2nd class blue business sheet M13L MBIL; (now available)
31. £1.28 green (2012 postage rate continued) De La Rue sheet MA13 MAIL

30 April 2013 blog
32. £2.00 blue-green De La Rue MA13 MAIL (first reprint since 2009)

9 May 2013 - Football Heroes
33. 1p maroon - PSB - M13L MPIL
34. 2p dark green - PSB - M13L MPIL
35. 5p ash pink - PSB - M13L MPIL
36. 10p orange-brown - PSB - M13L MPIL
37. 1st class red - PSB - M13L MPIL
38. 1st class red - mixed retail booklet - M13L MCIL

Also available
39. 1st class red - retail booklet of 12 - M13L MTIL
40. 1st class red - business sheet - M13L MBIL

Thanks Ken G for reminding me that on 3 January Royal Mail also made available the
41. 1st class red - self-adhesive coil - MA12 MRIL

Update 21 June
42.  2nd class Large counter sheet by De La Rue MA13 MAIL reported on eBay

17 July
88p and £1.88p available by De La Rue with printing date and sheet numbers.

Update 29 July
43.  20p counter sheets MA13 MAIL by De La Rue - now in stock

Update 12 August
44.  1st class Large retail booklet MA13 MFIL

Update 24 August
45.  1st class GOLD coil MA12/MRIL
46.  2nd class Large retail booklet MA13 MFIL

47.  2nd Large MA13 business sheet

13 September
48.  10p counter sheet MA13

Available at Stampex 18/19 September
49.  1st class MA13 counter sheet
50.  1st class Large MA13 counter sheet
51.  5p MPIL gummed with inverted perfs from Merchant Navy PSB
52.  50p MPIL gummed with inverted perfs from Merchant Navy PSB

53.   2nd class MA13 counter sheet

54.   1st Large MA13 business sheet
 

Now 54 Machin definitives this year!  How close was your guess?


Other possibilities before the end of the year, or early next year depending on demand and original print-runs:
1p, 2p, 5p, 50p, £1 counter sheet with MA13 code
£1.50, £3, £5 counter sheet with MA13 code

And maybe the first 2014 PSB (at Spring Stampex) will have 2013 year codes?

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Stamp News update 8 May 2013

As we have been away for a few days, here is another brief post to provide news of various matters.


Faststamps overprinted with 'Australia 2013 World Stamp Expo'

The UK-printed versions of the Australia 2013 Faststamps (with location-code GB) may now be ordered from Royal Mail Tallents House, in collectors sets of 6 at £6.42 ONLY:

Stock code ZS022 - Union Flag with Australia 2013 overprint 
Stock code ZS023 - Machin head with Australia 2013 overprint

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New Tariff Machin definitives 27 March

Official first day covers distributed by Royal Mail were all believed to have stamps printed by De La Rue all coded MA13.  However, we understand that some have the De La Rue Signed For stamps, but 78p, 88p and £1.88 stamps by Walsall coded M13L.  These may have been covers made up manually to be used as replacements for any which had been damaged in transit to standing order customers.

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88p Amber De La Rue sheet printing seen

The 88p DLR sheet-printed stamps have now appeared on eBay.  We hope to have these in stock soon.

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New Exhibition Sheet 2 August 2013

The Fédération Internationale de Philatélie (FIP) nominated Thailand as the country to host the World Stamp Exhibition in 2013, which will be held in Bangkok from 2nd to 14th August 2013, and will commemorate the 130th anniversary of Thai postage stamps and the establishment of the Thai postal service.  Royal Mail will issue the usual style of exhibition sheet, printed by Cartor Security Print and containing 20 x 1st class Hello stamps and 10 different pictorial labels.

Freshwater Life and Butterflies stamps coming in the summer

We're now able to show you the images for two sets of stamps to be issued in the summer.   On 25 June the second set of 'Freshwater Life' Faststamps will be issued from (Wincor-Nixdorf) Post and Go machines in Post Office branches throughout the country.  

Water creatures from Lakes are, shown from upper left to lower right:
Perch, European Eel, Crucian Carp, Cadis-fly Larva, Arctic Char, Common Toad.

As usual these will be available for 6 service-indicators, with a total face value of £6.42.  At Autumn Stampex it is expected that these will be available from Hytech v2 machines.

Official First Day Postmarks (other special postmarks will be on our website)

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The 10 x 1st class Butterfly stamps will be issued on 11 July just before the National Butterfly Count campaign run by charity Butterfly Conservation.  

These are now images of the actual stamps (click on the images to see enlargements):

 Row 1: Comma, Orange Tip, Small Copper, Chalkhill Blue, Swallowtail

 Row 2: Purple Emperor, Marsh Fritillary, Brimstone, Red Admiral, Marbled White.

The 37 x 35 mm stamps will be printed in two sheets of 25/50 by Cartor Security Print in litho.  The design agency is MARCandANNA.

UPDATE MAY 2013
Royal Mail have sneaked into the programme another mixed retail stamp book: the Chalkhill blue and Comma will be issued in a self-adhesive booklet of 6 stamps with 4 x 1st class red Machin definitives which have code M13L MCIL.

A very colourful set which ought to be popular.

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Two/Three more new Machin definitive stamps for 2013

Following the issue of the Royal Mail red series of stamps on 3 January (with 2012 year codes) we reported the sale of the 1st class booklet of 6, and the 2nd class booklet of 12 with M13L codes.

As reported last week, the new tariff stamps have MA13 codes, except for the Walsall printing of the specific valued stamps which have M13L.  Apparently all should have had M13L but for some reason De La Rue used cylinders with MA13 on.

Late last week came the discover of two more M13L/MA13 stamps.  The 2nd class Business Sheet M13L was first discovered in used condition (so remember to look at all your incoming post, carefully!), and then the £1.28 sheet stamp was found from a new De La Rue MA13 printing with no date or sheet numbers.  (Thanks again to Richard P for these images.)

UPDATE: De La Rue's printing of the £1.88 has now been found, still with no sheet number or date.

2013 New Tariff definitive stamps: De La Rue printing in Presentation Packs

Readers will recall Royal Mail's warning that delivery of the new tariff stamps to collectors would be delayed but that stamps (but not presentation packs) would be in Post Offices by the issue date.

We later found this was because of De La Rue's production difficulties associated with the move from Dunstable to Gateshead, difficulties which saw production of the 78p, 88p and £1.88 stamps sub-contracted to Walsall Security Print.  De La Rue printed the new Signed For stamps.

Now that the Presentation Packs are available, we find that that they contain stamps which are not the same as those printed by Walsall SP, which almost certainly means that they were printed by De La Rue.   How can we tell, from single stamps?  The Walsall stamps have a year code of M13L - those in the pack have a year code - like the Signed For stamps - of MA13. 

Presentation pack (with guillotined edges)

Original supplies:

We don't of course, know the printing dates for the De La Rue printings yet but will report them as soon as we do.

Meanwhile, can anybody tell us which stamps are on Royal Mail's official FDCs?

UPDATE 11 April
Thank you all for the contributions, we now know that Royal Mail's official FDCs have the De La Rue printings of all stamps.  The presentation packs were available from Friday 5th April, which ought to make that the official first day of availability of the 78p, 88p and £1.88p despite the 27 March date that will be on those covers.  

The stamps on the FDC received here are noticeably different to those in the pack. The text in the iridescent layer is noticeably 'blotchier', reminiscent of the late printings of the 2009/10 stamps.  On most values the M of MA13 is almost a rectangle of dark, with very little definition. 

The Walsall and Signed For stamps, of course, were available on 27 March, so those should be more collectable.  Anybody doing double-dated covers?

UPDATE 12 April
It is now clear that some Tallents House subscribers for single stamps are receiving De La Rue (cut) examples whilst others are receiving Walsall examples.  This may be because the DLR stock left over from producing FDCs and Presentation Packs is now all exhausted, or it may just be that the stock of singles is mixed and customers will get one or the other or a mixture.  It seems that at this stage there are no sheets of De La Rue printing available.

UPDATE 9 May
De La Rue sheet printings are now appearing in post office branches.  The £1.88 (and £1.28 MA13) were reported in mid-April, the 88p (and £2 MA13) at the end of the month.

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