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28 March 2024

Get Christmas cards on Easter? Blame PO Box

Published
By Majorie van Leijen

Do you always receive plenty of greeting cards during festive occasions? Or did you find yourself writing your own Christmas card just to make the chimney look a little less empty this year?

Not receiving best wishes from friends and family in the form of physical greeting cards or letters doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ve lost touch with your loved ones – you just might have lost touch with your postman.

A poll run by Emirates 24|7 asked our readers how often they received their greeting cards on time. Strikingly, more than half of the respondents said they never receive their mail on time. And just 14 per cent said they always receive their mail on time.

The poll was specific to mail received through a PO Box, the most common mail delivery method in the UAE (residents can purchase a personal PO Box at one of the Emirates Post offices for Dh200 per year).

A common practice is to receive mail through organisational PO Box, where mail from within the UAE as well as mail from abroad can be received.

Although national mail usually arrives on time, overseas post often arrives months later or never at all, claim residents.

“In May, our family in UK sent us greetings cards for big birthday and anniversary and not one of them arrived! They were posted from different parts of UK, so I guess it was at this end something went astray,” a resident in Dubai writes on an online forum.

In the poll, readers were asked to specify how often they receive their mail on time based on the options ‘always’, ‘sometimes’, ‘almost never’ and ‘never’. While 57 per cent said to never receive their mail on time, another 10 per cent answered ‘almost never’ while 19 per cent replied with ‘sometimes’.

At the same time, it is difficult to understand what determines the success rate of post delivered. While some residents claim that no mail ever comes through, others are more optimistic about their mail delivery.

 “I have a personal PO Box and I always receive my mail. There might be a slight delay in international mail, but not more than two weeks,” said Maisa Mohammad, an Indian resident.

 Other residents speculate that it is mostly greeting cards that do not reach their destination, while packages are more likely to arrive.

“Cards almost always turn up months later. I’m not sure why, but may bank statements reach me more or less on time whereas ‘thicker’ envelopes with cards etc. either don’t turn up or if they do, they turn up late and they’ve almost always been opened,” says Mushtaq Malik, a UK national.

In order to receive mail through the PO Box, the sender must clearly mention the PO Box number, emirate and country, and address the receiver on the item sent.

Recently, Emirates Post upgraded its mail delivery system with an option to receive mail at your doorsteps. For certain villa types in selected areas, the post office offers the My Home PO Box. For Dh750 per year, mail will be delivered 3 times a week, and the frequency can be increased to 6 times a week for Dh1,250.

Not directly to the doorstep but still close from home is the My Building option, where residents purchase a personal PO Box in the lobby of their building for Dh450 per year. For Dh300 per year residents can purchase a My Zone PO box, which will be located in a certain area.

These options are limited to certain buildings and areas, although the number of options has increased this year.

With the uncertainty of receiving some mail to any PO Box, residents claim to resort to courier services instead. A number of private courier services offer mail delivery from packages to greeting card. These services are known to be reliable, although more expensive.

Emirates 24|7 was yet to receive answers to our queries from Emirates Post at the time of writing this article.