Junk mail

Nishi621

O.G.
Apr 30, 2006
10,330
26
It's funny how you can sometimes tell where junk snail mail senders get your name from and how quickly that happens!

Hubby opened an Old Navy cc back in December and put me down as an authorized user. He requested a card for me under my name. his handwriting isn't the best and I guess on the application it looked like what is really an "L" in our last name was a "U". When the card came, everything about my name was spelled correctly except for that one letter of our last name.

Anyway, today, I get some junk snail mail addressed to me from a totally different company than Old Navy, but the spelling of my last name has that same mistake in it! So, where else do I think they got my name from? Grr
 
Yeah... they totally sell peoples names! You'd be surprised, even places you donate to will sell your name or trade lists unless you specifically tell them that they cannot do that and then each place had their own way you go about doing that.
 
Crap...you caught me!!!! I knew I shouldn't have tried to throw you off by misspelling your last name... :nuts:

seriously though, I hate junk mail. It annoys me to no end!!!!! You know I used to write RETURN TO SENDER on all the credit apps I used to get at my old apartment and put them back in the mail...
 
I did a little "test" once and signed up for a store website's online news letter and I put my name as "Melanie Tunnicluck"...I get lots of mail now for Melanie Tunnicluck ;)
 
You can pretty much count on any business that has your address selling it.

When I had to start going to the dr all the time and buying a squillion prescriptions every month, within about 6 months our landline was getting so many junk calls that it literally became unusable.

The answering machine, which we were obliged to buy in order to avoid picking up the phone every other minute, just filled up two or three times a day with the things, we finally had to get a new number and NOT report that we had changed it!

But the best story of this involves a friend of mine, whose aunt got a phone back in the 1920s.

Long story short, even though the phone's "responsible party" changed hands from the aunt to my friend's mother to my friend, and even though the aunt died in the 1980s, to this day, my friend still receives junk mail, following her from address to address, frequently obviously "targeted" to her late aunt's demographic and purchasing habits, and always addressed to the now long-dead dead aunt.

So if it is any comfort, yes, they are selling our names right and left, but the people who buy them are also getting some real lemons in the bunch!
 
Oh man, I hate junk mail too - and what a WASTE of paper and resources!!!:hysteric:

You can submit your name to the DMA to get yourself taken off lists. It's not gonna stop everything but sure will decrease the amount of junk you get. Sign up here: https://www.dmaconsumers.org/cgi/offmailing

Also, credit cards usually have an opt-out policy so that they cannot sell your name to other vendors. Check the policy paper that came with your CC or call the 800# to find out how to opt-out.

I've also mailed back the order form - BLANK - in the postage-paid envelope. The stupid companies are paying for postage for a non-customer.:lol:

I think the post office does not provide the 'return to sender' service to anything except 1st class mail...so unless that junk wasn't mailed 3rd class bulk (many are), it will just end up in the trash at the USPS.
 
Crap...you caught me!!!! I knew I shouldn't have tried to throw you off by misspelling your last name... :nuts:

seriously though, I hate junk mail. It annoys me to no end!!!!! You know I used to write RETURN TO SENDER on all the credit apps I used to get at my old apartment and put them back in the mail...

that is better then my idea! i was going to stuff them all into one big envelope and mail it back

but your way saves me $$ :smile: yay.

as for junk mail, i think that's one reason why i'm still on AOL, i just hit report spam, and i never see that addresse again.
 
Since I've been pregnant I've been signing up for things left and right. I've decided to breastfeed, but if I hadn't I could probably go 6 months without buying formula! Junk mail I don't mind... catalogs are interesting to leaf through, but then they go to the crazy old man across the street who recycles as a retirement hobby, it's the credit card offers that get me. Those involve actual work before you can toss them out! I have to open it to make sure it's a cc offer, then pass it though the shredder, etc. It drives me nuts!