RE: Goodbye PO Box

[oldtimer]

Nicola posted: Adam and I have found a house! We move in on the 1st February! <3 <3

If you are on my facebook you can see pictures of the place. We are moving out of our parents and this will be our first home. We are really excited. We are too old to be with parents, really, so the independance is very much anticipated!

HOWEVER:

Our PO Box is up for renewel in March - it used to be £50 to have one for the year but it's gone up to over £100. We definitely won't be able to afford that as the house is unfurnished and we need to buy essentials like a washing machine, vacuum cleaner, etc.

So please be aware that the PO Box will be taken down in March. If you want to send anything to us please do so now because giving out our personal address is a big no, no, I'm afraid.

Any press kits will have to be sent electronically."

Congratulations on your new house!

I bet we could easily raise 100 British pounds before February 1st, to keep your PO Box open for you. Where can we donate? I know the PO Box plays an important part for artists submitting work to you, and other business mail. (remember, the more who donate, the less each donor pays, too)

Call it a housewarming gift!

[nicola]

Hi ya,

Thank you so much for your support! I've had a few messages regarding this. I'd just say to all that you can simply purchase some user trophies on the main site, so you can support your favourite artist at the same time. Make sure to write in the message that it's to go towards the PO Box, so Adam knows where to distribute it to. I think the PO Box will change though as I am moving 60 miles away so I can't imagine they will be too much of a gap when the PO Box will be down - if we raise enough money.

Trophy link: www.classical-crossover.co.uk/awards/user-trophies.html

Nic xx

[AJTilley]

Hi Everyone,

Ok for those out there donating/purchasing trophies to help towards this goal here is a tally of what has been received and what is needed.

FYI: PO box price is £200 for 1 year, unfortunately there isnt a po box depot in a convenient location to our new house, so we will have to choose the option whereby post is periodically delivered to us, even if there was a local depot the cost would still be £170.
As you can see: Royal Mail lists prices here: www.royalmail.com/delivery/inbound-mail/po-box/prices

I will keep this up to date as we receive items. If we dont hit the target, then the amounts will be used towards the ongoign costs of the site as normal. Thank you to anyone who does purchase towards this goal.

[nicola]

Sheesh! It doubled last year, and they've doubled it again?! It's a joke.

[nicola]

Updated again.

[pecanpraline]

Nicola and Adam,
Congratulations on your new home! I am sure you will be very happy. A first home is always very exciting!

[AJTilley]

Hey Everyone,

Thank you for your kind donations, we have reached the required amount to keep the PO box, as noted before the renewal is in March.

We will probably get the new PO box set-up slightly before the end of the current one so that no post is accidentally lost when we move the po box to the new depot.

Thank you again for your support it really helps.

[oldtimer]

Jan 12, 2012 15:26:37 GMT AJTilley said:

Hey Everyone,

Thank you for your kind donations, we have reached the required amount to keep the PO box, as noted before the renewal is in March.

We will probably get the new PO box set-up slightly before the end of the current one so that no post is accidentally lost when we move the po box to the new depot.

Thank you again for your support it really helps.

Fantastic! It's great to see people give a little back for all you and Nicola do here, not only for fans but especially for classical-crossover artists.

We've all (or a vast majority of us) been through the "first house on our own" days and know how financially strapping it can be, so I'm glad to see fans here give something back to help you guys out with this, so you can concentrate on the house instead.

Have fun setting the new place up!

[pecanpraline]

I'm delighted you have now received the amount you need for the PO Box. I knew we could do it! I can't imagine artists not being able to bombard you with photos and CDs!

[PO Box]

I don't see the address to the new PO Box listed. Do you still need additional funds?

[nicola]

No, we don't. We received enough. The new one is still processing - we will put it up as soon as it's ready. Why did you post as guest, Bonnie? xx

[pecanpraline]

Nicola,
I didn't know I did! I didn't know you could post as a guest. I thought only members could post.
I had trouble finding out how to begin a new thread when I wanted to leave a message about IL Volo being on PBS.
I am not computer friendly. It took me a long time to figure the new site out.
I think men and younger people do much better on these types of Forums.
Dottie, who did quite a bit of posting on the original site, came on here once or twice and gave up. I tried to explain it to her but that's like the blind leading the blind!!!1

[pecanpraline]

I should have mentioned in my last post that when the new site opened, I wrote something about the difficulty I was having understanding things. John was gracious enough to e-mail me and offer his help. So I could very easily have asked John how to post the topic about IL Volo. But I managed to figure it out for myself, it just took me some time!

[nicola]

Hey guys,

There has been a severe delay with this. Turns out that the Royal Mail have charged my personal account with £170 without telling me first for the OLD PO Box, which is, of course, not very helpful - it being 60 miles away from where we live, and me not having the money in my account in the first place! I have contacted them to give me my money back - had a battle on Friday on the phone with them, but they have referred me to e-mail them instead, to which they replied "we will answer within 10 working days", which doesn't help my emergency lack of money!

Because of this, we have terminated the current transaction of the new PO Box, as I am not taking chances for the Royal mail to take £370 from us (the £200 you gave us is still sitting in the Paypal account). They have taken the money from my PERSONAL account, not our CCUK account, and paypal will take just as long to transfer the money.

All in all, I am in a very tight corner, and the Royal Mail are being very slow. Once the muck up with the old PO Box is sorted and they give me my money back, we'll be able to re-submit for the new one in Northampton.

Unfortunately, they are, according to their terms and conditions, within their full right to not give me my money back. If this happens, we will just have to continue with the old one, which means I will only be able to check it once every few months when I visit my family. The new one we were setting up was going to deliver directly to our personal address (hence the extra £30 to bring it to £200) - so I was looking forward to that.

I would really like to not give my custom to the Royal Mail ever again if they don't give me my money back, but of course, that's rather unethical as you guys are the ones that have paid for the service. SO, whatever happens, there will still be a PO Box, but I think we are going to waiting for another three weeks at least. So sorry about the confusion and delay guys.

[dfwtexan42]

Royal Mail seems an rather unmotivated lot, or am I over generalizing?