A postage stamp is a small piece of paper issued by a post office, postal administration, or other authorized vendors to customers who pay postage, who then affix the stamp to the face or address-side of any item of mail—an envelope or other postal cover —that they wish to send. The item is then processed by the postal system, where a postmark or cancellation mark—in modern usage indicating date and point of origin of mailing—is applied to the stamp and its left and right sides to prevent its reuse. The item is then delivered to its addressee.
A postmark is a postal marking made on an envelope, parcel, postcard or the like, indicating the place, date and time that the item was delivered into the care of a postal service, or sometimes indicating where and when received or in transit. Modern postmarks are often applied simultaneously with the cancellation or killer that marks postage stamps as having been used. Sometimes a postmark alone is used to cancel stamps, and the two terms are often used interchangeably. Postmarks may be applied by handstamp or machine, using methods such as rollers or inkjets, while digital postmarks are a recent innovation.
The mail or post is a system for physically transporting postcards, letters, and parcels. A postal service can be private or public, though many governments place restrictions on private systems. Since the mid-19th century, national postal systems have generally been established as a government monopoly, with a fee on the article prepaid. Proof of payment is usually in the form of an adhesive postage stamp, but a postage meter is also used for bulk mailing. With the advent of email, the retronym "snail mail" was coined.
A cancellation is a postal marking applied on a postage stamp or postal stationery to deface the stamp and to prevent its reuse. Cancellations come in a huge variety of designs, shapes, sizes, and colors. Modern cancellations commonly include the date and post office location where the stamps were mailed, in addition to lines or bars designed to cover the stamp itself. The term "postal marking" sometimes is used to refer specifically to the part that contains the date and posting location, but the term is often used interchangeably with "cancellation." The portion of a cancellation that is designed to deface the stamp and does not contain writing is also called the "obliteration" or killer. Some stamps are issued pre-cancelled with a printed or stamped cancellation and do not need to have a cancellation added. Cancellations can affect the value of stamps to collectors, positively or negatively. Cancellations of some countries have been extensively studied by philatelists, and many stamp collectors and postal history collectors collect cancellations in addition to the stamps themselves.
Indian postal systems for efficient military and governmental communications had developed long before the arrival of Europeans. When the Portuguese, Dutch, French, Danish and British conquered the Marathas who had already defeated the Mughals, their postal systems existed alongside those of many somewhat independent states. The British East India Company gradually annexed the other powers on the sub-continent and brought into existence a British administrative system over most of modern-day India, with a need to establish and maintain both official and commercial mail systems.
In philately, the term cover pertains to the outside of an envelope or package with an address, typically with postage stamps that have been cancelled and is a term generally used among stamp and postal history collectors. The term does not include the contents of the letter or package, although they may add interest to the item if still present. Cover collecting plays an important role in postal history as many covers bear stamps, postmarks and other markings along with names and addresses all of which help to place a cover at a given time and place in history.
This is an overview of the postage stamps and postal history of Australia.
An adhesive label or sticky label is a small piece of paper designed to be affixed to any surface such as paper, plastic, wood, glass, or metal, typically by the action of a layer of adhesive on the front or back of the label. The term adhesive refers to a sticky substance, while something that is self-adhesive implies that it will stick without wetting or the application of glue to the product.
A revenue stamp, tax stamp, duty stamp or fiscal stamp is a (usually) adhesive label used to collect taxes or fees on documents, tobacco, alcoholic drinks, drugs and medicines, playing cards, hunting licenses, firearm registration, and many other things. Typically, businesses purchase the stamps from the government, and attach them to taxed items as part of putting the items on sale, or in the case of documents, as part of filling out the form.
A postage meter or franking machine is a mechanical device used to create and apply physical evidence of postage to mailed items. Postage meters are regulated by a country's postal authority. A postage meter imprints an amount of postage, functioning as a postage stamp, a cancellation and a dated postmark all in one. The meter stamp serves as proof of payment and eliminates the need for adhesive stamps.
In philately, indicia are markings on a mail piece showing that postage has been prepaid by the sender. Indicia is the plural of the Latin word indicium, meaning distinguishing marks, signs or identifying marks. The term imprinted stamp is used more or less interchangeably, but some indicia are not imprinted stamps. One example is the handstamp, which can be seen in a photo on this page.
A stamp vending machine (SVM) is a mechanical, electrical or electro-mechanical device which can be used to automatically vend postage stamps to users in exchange for a pre-determined amount of money, normally in coin. Most SVMs were positioned in public places to provide a useful service to customers when other sources of postage stamps, such as Post Offices were closed. The term is often applied to the entire object as found attached to a pillar box or sited in a wall. The name Stamp Vending Machine only applies to the internal mechanism, the housing is described by the UK Post Office as a "case" and was supplied, installed and maintained separately. Many postal administrations around the world have used automatic stamp vending machines including the United States, where private manufacturers began vending stamps from coils in 1908. Most countries of the Commonwealth of Nations have issued stamps for use in Stamp Vending Machines, including Hong Kong, New Zealand and Malta.
Definitive postage stamps of Ireland are the regular series of definitive postage stamps issued by the Irish Free State between 1922 and 1937 and by Republic of Ireland since 1937. Nine distinctly different series of designs have been released; additionally the watermark was changed for two issues and the currency was changed on three occasions while the designs remained the same.
Neopost web-enabled stamps or Neopostage is a postage stamp that is part of the family of computerized postage. These stamps were developed by Neopost Online and Northrop Grumman Corporation. The joint effort resulted in an innovative self-service stamp vending system. Neopost Online is a US subsidiary of Neopost Inc. Testing of this system was authorized by the United States Postal Service (USPS) in March 2001.
In philately, an imprinted stamp is a stamp printed onto a piece of postal stationery such as a stamped envelope, postal card, letter sheet, letter card, aerogram or wrapper. The printing may be flat upon the surface of the paper, or embossed with a raised relief. An imprinted stamp is also known as unadhesive stamp or indicium.
A meter stamp, or meter mark, is the impression made by a postage meter machine that indicates that postage has been paid on a letter or parcel. Meter stamps are widely used by businesses and organisations as they are more efficient than using postage stamps.
The Washington–Franklin Issues are a series of definitive U.S. Postage stamps depicting George Washington and Benjamin Franklin, issued by the U.S. Post Office between 1908 and 1922. The distinctive feature of this issue is that it employs only two engraved heads set in ovals—Washington and Franklin in full profile—and replicates one or another of these portraits on every stamp denomination in the series. This is a significant departure from previous definitive issues, which had featured pantheons of famous Americans, with each portrait-image confined to a single denomination. At the same time, this break with the recent past represented a return to origins. Washington and Franklin, after all, had appeared on the first two American stamps, issued in 1847, and during the next fifteen years, each of the eight stamp denominations available featured either Washington or Franklin.
A Horizon label is an adhesive postage label that is a type of variable value stamp. The labels were introduced in the United Kingdom in 2002 as part of the computerisation of the counter services of the post office network of Royal Mail using the Horizon System.
Post & Go stamps, also called Faststamps, are variable rate postage stamps printed on self-adhesive labels and sold by stamp vending machines by Royal Mail in the United Kingdom, as well as by Jersey Post, Guernsey Post, the Royal Gibraltar Post Office and Q-Post (Qatar).
Revenue stamps of Guyana refer to the various revenue or fiscal stamps, whether adhesive, directly embossed or otherwise, which have been issued by Guyana since its independence in 1966. Prior to independence, the country was known as British Guiana, and it had issued its own revenue stamps since the 19th century. Guyana used dual-purpose postage and revenue stamps until 1977, and it issued revenue-only stamps between 1975 and the 2000s. The country has also issued National Insurance stamps, labels for airport departure tax and excise stamps for cigarettes and alcohol.
