Every month I get 5-10 cards from the bureau which were sent by US operators.
These cards are for ZF operations I have done, yet the sending station knew
my home call and so marked the cards "via AA6KX". The way I read the ARRL
rules on the outgoing bureau, US operators are not supposed to use the
outgoing bureau for US-bound cards. So, in theory, they would have to have
sent these cards directly to each of the 10 call area incoming bureaus. I'm
sure that's not the way it's working in practice, though, and the outgoing
bureau guys are just nice enough to route these cards along to the incoming
bureau handlers. But once they get to me, I'm never quite sure how to handle
them. I've been just sending a response back direct, though with only a
19 cent stamp rather than using an envelope. But that gets to be a real
pain after a while. Believe it or not, some of the card designs make it real
difficult to find the name and address! Had the sender not marked the cards
"via AA6KX", the cards would have gone on to the ZF incoming bureau and then
eventually would be mixed in with the giant stack I get about once a year
from the ZF bureau. I have found that the ARRL outgoing bureau will handle
US-bound cards from a "foreign" operator, so if I send a stack of only ZF
cards, they will handle them for me. But the 5-10 a month that come from
the US bureau don't justify the $2 handling charge.
What do other people with this problem do? As I see it, the options are:
(a) Toss them. (Not a good idea, in my book.)
(b) Reply direct. (Gets expensive and is time consuming.)
(c) Hold them a year or so and toss the replies in with the big bunch
that comes from the ZF bureau. (Probably won't win me points for
promptness.)
(d) Sort them by call area and send them to the call area incoming
bureaus. (From my perspective, this is equivalent to option (b)).
(e) Send the whole stack (of 8 to 10 cards) along with a $2 check to the
ARRL outgoing bureau..
Are there any other options?
Bruce, AA6KX
zf8bs@twg.com
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