Barcoded Machin and other forgeries - but why bother?

I received these forgeries recently.  The person who sent me these singles received them as samples from a 'wholesaler' in Hong Kong (or Mainland China*) of British and French stamps.

I can understand why the crooks would want to forge the 1st and 2nd class stamps, and maybe the Large versions - but the airmail values?  The £1.85 stamp doesn't even have a current postage use, without make-ups.

Which is which? 

£1.85 Barcoded Machin Definitive - and forgery

£2.55 Barcoded Machin Definitive - and forgery

£3.25 Barcoded Machin Definitive - and forgery

£4.20 Barcoded Machin Definitive - and forgery

The forgeries are on the right. What is not visible in these pictures is that all these have source code MBIL at the top right, suggesting that the origin of the iridescent image is business sheets.  

As usual with these forgeries the ROYAL MAIL text over the Queen's profile is in horizontal parallel lines,  but unlike some forgeries, the barcode printing is raised and glossy rather than flat.

Glossy barcode on £3.25 forgery.

ROYAL MAIL iridescent printing in parallel horizontal lines

Glossy barcode on £4.20 forgery.

ROYAL MAIL iridescent printing in parallel horizontal lines

Coming from the same stable is the England barcoded country 1st class definitive.  (I don't have a genuine one for comparison.)

Glossy barcode on 1st class England forgery.

.... and the lower values from the Aardman special issues (also self-adhesive) issued in October 2022.

Forged 1st & 2nd class Aardman commemorative stamps.

An interesting thing about this set is that the same stamps have also been reported on different backing paper.  This version has only one row of small text on the backing paper:

Forged 2nd class Aardman commemorative stamp - different backing paper.

These are the pictures sent to our correspodent by the 'wholesaler' offering him some bargain prices. The writer was an eBay user who had been a member since April 2022 and had - apparently - no dealings at all through ebay, with zero feedback and no products offered for sale.  (* they used an email address ending .hk, but their eBay location translated as 'Mainland China'.)

Whole sheets which would fool many users and some collectors and dealers. 

Another source has sent me these 2nd class 2021 Christmas forgeries.  Again, I don't have genuine for comparison but the backing paper is trademarked on the reverse, and the barcoded piece even has a join!

 

 

Two different 2nd class Christmas 2021 stamps, with the barcoded one having two sheets of paper joined.

Oracal is an international company supplying 'vinyl' for printing. That is, from what I can understand, the sort of easy-fix vinyl used in advertising and customising vehicles, which may be peelable (temporary and repositionable), or permanent (with a 2-3 year guarantee).  This vinyl has backing paper.  The paper shown above stamps appears to be backing paper from that sort of product.  Certainly that's what comes from a search for 'Oracal Print Vinyl permanent'.

I can find nothing in Oracal which suggests that they have a product suitable for stamp printing with an Oracal backing,  The backing paper used for these stamps is much thicker than modern backing paper, even for business sheets.

Update: Closer examination reveals that these Christmas stamps have been restuck onto this backing paper: they are not properly aligned and some have folded corners or creases.

Obviously in time Royal Mail will not be supplying Machin stamps when their supplies are exhausted and replaced by the King Charles III definitives - although we expect that those might also be forged before long.  The forgers are being careful not to offer them before they are widely available from legitimate sources!

Swao-out surpluses

But what about those collectors and dealers who have genuinely acquired barcoded stamps from Royal Mail's swap-out scheme, and now find - as I predicted last year - that they have far more than they use and need to sell them at a discount.  How will the people who have been buying from China be persuaded to buy from us instead !?

Maybe the United States Postal Service (USPS) has the answer? 

Defeating counterfeit postage – In Financial Year 2022, the Postal Service and Postal Inspection Service seized more than 340,000 packages with counterfeit postage and more than 7.7 million counterfeit stamps with an estimated $7.8 million loss avoidance for the Postal Service. Expanded actions to crack down on fraudulent postage include:

* Postal Service interdictions of packages with counterfeit labels affixed. The Postal Service will fully exercise new authority to take possession and dispose of packages identified with counterfeit postage.

* Reviews of shipments on Postal Service docks and during warehouse outreach visits

* Shut down of websites and closure of eCommerce accounts selling counterfeit postage

* Engagement and partnership with eCommerce companies to disrupt activity

* Customs and Border Protection (CBP) collaboration

* Promotion of the Inspection Service’s rewards program which provides rewards for information leading to the arrest and conviction of a person that unlawfully uses, reuses, or forges postage stamps, postage meter stamps, permit imprints, or other postage; or uses, sells, or possesses with the intent to sell any used, forged, or counterfeit postage stamp or other postage.

Throughout the year, the Postal Inspection Service will continue to partner with federal, state, and local authorities to enforce the laws and bring criminals to justice. The Postal Service and Postal Inspection Service will continue to adapt to evolving security threats and implement expanded measures to safeguard Postal employees and preserve the security of the mail that Postal Service customers expect and deserve.

They seem to be making some progress especially with the rewards programme which rewards those who shop the criminals.  But it is clearly not enough.  With echoes of Royal Mail's 'the innocent recipient pays' policy, the USPS recently made this announcement - which was not received well!. (My emphasis.)

In recent years, a surge in the use of counterfeit postage has been found in the mail stream. The intentional use, or sale, of counterfeit postage is a crime because it seeks to obtain services without payment. This activity reflects an intentional effort to defraud the Postal Service of the funds it needs to provide services to the public.

 In response to this problem, the Postal Service is filing a federal register notice about changes to the Mailing Standards of the United States Postal Service, Domestic Mail Manual (DMM®), that will allow the Postal Service to treat items found in the mail stream bearing counterfeit postage as abandoned. “As the most trusted government agency in the nation, we will continue to work together with other law enforcement and government agencies to protect the sanctity of the mail,” said Chief Postal Inspector Gary Barksdale.

The Postal Service’s proposed changes will provide the public notice of the handling of items bearing counterfeit postage. Under the revision articles found in the mails with counterfeit postage will be considered abandoned and may be opened and disposed of at the Postal Service’s discretion. The mission of the Postal Service and the Postal Inspection Service is to ensure the safety, security, and integrity of the U.S. Mail. The implementation of these new regulations will continue to support and enhance this mission.

Consumers purchasing online items may be surprised to find out that the vendor mailed their goods using counterfeit postage. Under the new regulations, such items will be considered abandoned and disposed of at the Postal Service’s discretion. When this occurs, consumers will have to seek recourse from the vendor.

USPS stamps are being forged extensively and advertised as being shipped direct from China. But given Royal Mail's record with identification of forgeries - or misidentifying genuine stamps as forgeries - there is ample evidence that a legal challenge to such a policy here could be successful.

Let's hope it never comes to that, but I do wonder what Royal Mail can do to stop this influx.

UPDATE: I have been provided with this email address for people to send information about new forgeries and new outlets to Royal Mail.

But of course for new forgeries, we would like to have the information and images at the same time!

email address stampsintelligence@royalmail.com  

 

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Forgeries masquerading as 'used for research' stamps in online auction offers.

I have frequently reported on Machin definitive stamps which appeared to be, or definitely were, forgeries.  And at the end of November I reproduced the press release from the Charity Commission suggesting that charities should not be selling kiloware because it could enable people to mine the sacks for uncancelled stamps which could be resold for reuse.

If you've looked at GB stamps on eBay you have probably seen the occasional (or many!) offers for used but uncancelled stamps which are being sold - either "for philatelic research and not reuse" or without that caveat, or affixed to supplies of envelopes for reuse.  And there was the prosecution of a couple for laundering stamps and reselling them for reuse.

Recently I was shown a selection of forgeries available online.

But there are others who don't go to that trouble as shown in the pictures here.   This sheetlet of 25 1st class country definitives (including, bizarrely, the Welsh flag stamp) look reasonable, but why are they on the same sheet of glossy backing paper?  Because they are self-adhesive!

Of course the only time they were issued as self-adhesive was in Smilers/Generic sheets - but not with that font.  All - except the centre column - have the denomination in the new 2018 font.

Once they are affixed to an envelope, or package, would anybody notice that they were not quite right?  Probably not.  They are apparently printed in larger sheets because the right-hand edge has the impression of die-cut perforations: it seems that the stamps were printed at least 11 stamps wide, and one column was removed before being cut into sheetlets of 25.

Of course if you wanted to send parcels a higher denomination would be useful:

On the right, the original £5 from 1977.  On the left, the 2017 Accession commemoration with a paler head, and iridescent printing.  In the centre, a self-adhesive version of the Accession stamp with the original type of head, but also with iridescent printing.  In the picture below the 2017 and self-adhesive stamps are reversed - and you can certainly see the iridescent printing, or however it is created.

If it is smaller packets, not needing a £5 stamp, then how about some more country definitives, the £1 or £1.05 - and they'll do for letters to Europe as well.

In all cases the stamps on paper are unused self-adhesive forgeries, the others are genuine with ordinary gum.   Notice the very poor colour matching, and the reversed-out value on the Scotland stamps, instead of it being in silver.

What's very odd is the England stamps.  Can the genuine colour be so hard to reproduce?  Or have the forgers been given some Royal Mail publicity images to colour match.  Those are the stamps which really stand out as being 'wrong'.  These images below are just two of the colour error pictures that Royal Mail sent out or published in their Philatelic Bulletin.

2nd class stamps have also been forged - again, self-adhesive, with new font denominations.

Earlier I showed some Christmas forgeries, including this one which was too small.

And there are others - these have entirely the wrong (die-cut) perforation, compare the genuine (on the left) in the lower picture:

 

There are so many questions.

Would a user of stamps recognise any of these as being forgeries?  Probably not.

Would Royal Mail Revenue Protection (RP) recognise any of them - aside from the fact that there are no phosphor bands - or even imitation ones?   On non-machineable packets they would probably not be flagged up to RP anyway.

When I was first shown these I asked the question that brought the answer that is the title of this post.  Why on earth would forgers produce such a wide range of stamps?  Different values yet, but why all the different stamps?  It could only be so that they could be sold as previously used.   As it states in the eBay description:

 

Royal Mail really do have a problem, and not just with laundering of pre-used stamps!

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Machin datamatrix forgeries widely available: Royal Mail powerless?

Many people predicted that it wouldn't be long before the regular stamp forgery operations would turn their attention to the ones that would be usable next year, rather than producing more than could not.

While a few stamp dealers people are selling 1st and 1st Large stamps as forgeries for collectors, with proper descriptions and above face value, many more are selling to unsuspecting members of the public - and to some collectors and stamp dealers, though bogus websites with links to China.  This is in line with the forgery of modern US postage stamps where the sellers even declare that they will be shipped from China!

So to the first examples, the 1st class business sheet:

Forged pair of 1st class purple business sheet Machin datamatrix stamps.

If your eyesight is good you will be able to see the giveaway clues from the picture as is; if not click on it to see it larger.  If you can't see it then, use your smartphone's QR-code reader to scan the barcodes, and take a screenshot or copy down the resulting display.

If you scan all four, you will see two different.  The stamps in position 1 are both the same; ditto the stamps in position two (and every other position).  As you should know by now, every genuine stamp is different.

The method is simple: take a high-quality scan of an original sheet, make a new litho plate, and print.  I say litho, because that is cheaper than gravure, although the ones that have been sent to me are still on the way, so I don't know the process used.  

UPDATE 3 September:  I've now received one of the forgeries through the post, and the differences are quite obvious on the 1st class.  The finish is glossy, as with many previous forgeries, and there are no obvious phosphor bands, not that they are easy to see on the genuine stamps. This picture shows the glossiness (forgery above).

At higher magnification the screening on the forgery is very obvious (click on the images to enlarge):

1st class datamatrix Machin definitive - Forgery on the left, genuine on the right.

The perforation teeth on the forgery are more pointed although the elliptical perforation is a good match.

Lastly the barcode is not raised (3D) and glossy as on the genuine, it is flat and exactly the same printing as the stamp. 

Genuine, left, and forged 1st class datamatrix Machin definitive stamp.

Here is a scan I was sent of the 1st class Large.  One is a forgery and one genuine (I'm told).  I think the forgery may be the one with the FSC logo closer to the colour of the stamps, rather than the barcode.

UPDATE 18 October 2022

I have been told that the 2nd and 2nd large sheets of 50 and 2nd and 1st books of eight, exist; these were printed a number of weeks ago. No images are available yet. 

The websites that have been offering [the original] stamps include the following:

www.buys-online.com 

This site shows a contact address as

The address and phone number are genuine - it's Royal Mail's St Albans Delivery Office.

The complaint email address is used on a large number of websites selling everything from stamps to handbags, and kayaks!

Google search results for the email address used.

Note near the end of page 1 of this list, we see shop.postnord.se. Whilst this is not a current URL, www.postnord.se is, being the Danish-Swedish combined postal service, Swedish website. But the URL of the site is www.postnords.com, and shows much the same as the above images for the bogus Royal Mail site - British stamps.

Another site with the same 'ownership' shows these American stamps.  

Bogus USPS.com website almost certainly selling forged stamps.

Royal Mail's new barcode scanning equipment is not installed widely, if at all.  I don't know what last year's trial was supposed to establish - nobody ever saw any of the stamps used and the unsold 2nd class blue are now being distributed through Post Office Ltd, which means that the sales of 2nd class green business sheets this year are likely to be low - maybe next year, in which case there shouldn't be a 2023 reprint.

They are aware of these forgeries, but will make no announcement - well, that would be an egg-on-face time, wouldn't it?  Of course there is activity behind the scenes but they didn't stop more than a decade of forgeries of the gold and red security stamps, so how will they do anything now?

So what does this mean for the stamp buyer, and for Royal Mail?

Royal Mail still have a mountain to climb when it comes to getting all the revenue for the post they handle. The barcode has been no deterrent - in fact, I think the forgers see every new variant and anti-forgery measure as a challenge to be overcome!  There are also washed bar-coded stamps for sale on eBay.

The one single thing that would solve most of their problems at a stroke would involve extra work by their underpaid operatives, something which may be difficult to achieve whilst an industrial dispute is ongoing, but which could save enough money to at least contribute to the workers' demands being met.

If Royal Mail and Post Office Ltd managed to properly postmark every stamp that is used, then the chances of reuse would be reduced, and there would have been no need to set up expensive measures to detect reuse by mechanical means.  We know that they don't have time to detect forgeries by visual or current mechanical means, and there is no way they can do it with the new stamps.

1. Royal Mail need to set out clearly to Post Office Ltd what the requirements are for cancelling stamps on mail presented over the counter.  Some branches refuse outright, some will follow the rule (Large letters and parcels), and some will happily cancel stamps on any mail.  Remove the doubt and tell them to cancel all stamps on all mail - especially the expensive special delivery and international premium services.

With the latter being barcoded, it is easy to find out where they were posted. Use that to highlight need to further instruction and/or penalties.  I don't like hitting sub-postmaster's pockets but if they don't contribute to revenue protection how can they expect to receive adequate recompense from Royal Mail?

2. All business collections which include stamps should have those stamps cancelled on arrival at the first mail centre (MC), ie the one arranging the collection.  Yes, it's inconvenient and will slow down processing, but make allowances for that in the targets.  Provide MC staff with adequate metal or polymer handstamps to cancel all the stamps adquately (and possibly neatly).  The few businesses still using stamps on parcel mail must be in the stamp trade and this would produce a lot of goodwill as well. 

Mail Centres receiving parcels with uncancelled stamps should know where they have come from (a return address is a good clue), and omissions should be reported back so that the managers at the errant mail centre are penalised if this is not done.  Targets not met = performance pay not paid.

3. All mail centres must ensure that machineable mail is cancelled.  If it's not machineable then manual cancelling must be done.  Again, set targets, penalise if not met.

And to those who say, "it all takes time' - that doesn't wash.  If you are in a mail centre not cancelling the stamps then it may save you time, but down the line somebody will have to do it, even if it is the bloke with the trolley delivering to the door.  Why should the postie out in the rain and snow have to do it because somebody in a nice warm mail centre didn't?

Consumers face a different problem.  As I have pointed out previously the swap-out scheme means that there will be a lot of unwanted new barcoded stamps on the market at reduced prices.

Anybody trading in a collection and ending up with several thousand 2nd class stamps will need to find an outlet, at a discount.  How does the buyer ensure that what he is buying is genuine and that there is a genuine reason for the discount.

The seller should explain just why he is able (or must) sell at a discount.  2nd class stamps bought for as little as 14p are worth 68p.  A collector selling them for 40p will be able to show the paperwork from Royal Mail, and maybe a photocopy of the stamps sent in.  

Buyers should beware - if you buy two sheets of stamps check that the barcodes are different on the same positioned stamp on both sheets.  If not, you have a wrong'un, but ultimately, buy from trusted sources.  Look at the terms, contact details, etc  If they look wrong, they probably are.  Try these examples:

mailshop1 Terms of Service 

This website is operated by . Throughout the site, the terms “we”, “us” and “our” refer to . offers this website, including all information, tools and services available from this site to you, the user, conditioned upon your acceptance of all terms, conditions, policies and notices stated here.

Privacy statement ends:

Contact Us 

If you have any questions regarding this Privacy Statement or its implementation, here is how you can reach us:

Delivery Information

6. Where we ship to

Ships to almost all countries around the world, covering North and South America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Oceania, and more. We use the services of major, trusted international carriers to ensure your package reaches your destination safely and securely. Please see the table below to check if we ship to your country. .

No list follows this!

BEWARE!

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Why produce forgeries of old special (non-definitive) stamps?

It's a question I asked myself when I first heard about these and then saw a couple online.  The stamps in everyday use are the definitives - Machins or King Charles.  These are the ones that people buy normally, and they will be the ones they most often buy (forged) at a discount from online sources.

Most traders will be happy with definitives; Postcrossers and individuals who like attractive, different, stamps may be attracted to something less usual, like the pictorial country definitives.

And those people may like to have the others which have been forged, the Aardman specials, for instance, or these Classic Children's Television, originally issued in 2014.  Thank you to AB for these forgeries.

These are all scanned in pairs with the same settings, and then one of each stamp is copied along side the other to produce matching pairs (I didn't want to split the strips, not least because I borrowed the genuines from Dave Evans of Jerwood Philatelics!)

Can you tell which is which?  Bear in mind that the colour registration of any Royal Mail stamps is not 100% accurate, so text often has a blurry appearance, but sometimes they are very crisp.

Which would you rather put on your letters, knowing that a forged stamp - IF detected - would attract a penalty charge of at least £2.50 on he recipient?

The forgeries are on the right, on slightly thinner paper.  But really, if you bought the ones on the right (bottom strip on the picture below) would you know that they were not genuine stamps?  The quality is superb - and there was no security printing on the backing paper - and although there are differences, which is which?

What you can't see from singles is that the spacing is wrong.  The genuine measure about 196.5 mm perf to perf.  The forgeries measure almost 198 mm.

Click on any image for an enlargement.

This is the shipping label that was on the package of stamps that AB was sent.

Note the endorsement, Shipper only, not seller.   I wonder what this means in practice and in law.  Clearly the shipper is 'sending forged stamps through the post' presumably with the intent that they would be used for postage.

It's much easier to forge self-adhesive stamps than normally gummed and perforated stamps.  

I wonder what other self-adhesive special stamps will be forged.

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