A surprise appearance of not one ,not two but three Wincor-Nixdorf printed MA13 Post and Stamps has occurred in the unique Self-service  branch- at Tudor Street, Ludgate Circus, London EC1.

The latest printings appear to have been installed in the last few days, a visit earlier this week has revealed.

It certainly is an interesting development and has provided the last variants of the MA13 Post and Go stamps in the operational ‘Wincor’ format.

Machine 1 – Christmas Robins MA13

Machine 2 – Union Flag MA13

Machine 3 -Machin MA13

Autumn Stampex 2013 has just closed its doors, taking place between the dates of 18th-21st September at the Business Design Centre, Islington, London N1.

Royal Mail provided the now familiar configuration of Post and Go ”Royal Mail Series One’ machines Nos. A2, A3,A4  along with a “Instant Smiler ” printer.

They all have been busy over the last three days providing the standard fare of an overprinted Post and Go commemorative plus from Friday  the latest in the ‘Freshwater Life’ series (Rivers) along with On-Demand ‘Post and Go Instant Smilers’ as below:-

[table caption=”Autumn Stampex 2013 Post and Go Stamp availability” width=”500″ colwidth=”20|50|50|50|50″ colalign=”left|left|left|left|left”]
Machine,Wednesday,Thursday,Friday,Saturday
A2,Union Flag/Machin,Union Flag/Machin,F/water Life-Rivers/Union Flag,F/water Life-Rivers/Union Flag
A3,Union Flag/Machin,Union Flag/Machin,F/water Life-Rivers/Union Flag,F/water Life-Rivers/Union Flag
A4,Union Flag/Machin,Union Flag/Machin,Union Flag/Machin,Union Flag/Machin
B1,Union Flag,Union Flag,F/Water Life-Rivers,F/Water Life-Rivers
B2,Machin,Machin,Union Flag,Union Flag

Notes:,B1 and B2 Pre-Order and over-the-counter sales only,Both the ‘Union Flag’ and the Machin Post and Go Stamps had a ‘MA13′ underprint.,Union Flag over printed “The Coronation 60th Anniversary’.

[/table]

Various improvements have been made since previous events and it was noticed that the  machines benefited from a new-improved faster internet connection allowing for faster throughput of customers resulting in reduced queues compared to previous Stampex events..

19-20th July 2013 and the latest stop on the ‘Post and Go’ world tour brings two Royal Mail Post and Go machines (A3 and A4) to the York Racecourse

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http://www.stampshows.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4&Itemid=5

Following on from the success of the  exclusive Autumn Stampex 2010 ‘Arnold Machin’ faststamp overprint, Royal Mail have today announced that a further Stampex-only overprint will be available at Spring Stampex 2012.

This time the overprint will read ‘Diamond Jubilee 1952-2012’ and will be available throughout Stampex from both the self-service and over-the-counter Hytech machines.

The ‘Diamond Jubilee’ overprint will be combined with Farm Animal (Sheep) offerings, in a similar way to the Autumn 2011 Stampex.

The Trial of Hytech “Postalvision” Post and Go kiosks is currently in full swing at the Spring Stampex in London. On the first and second days the two machines did brisk business with collectors keen to obtain examples of the unique Machin strips that were available.

The Hytech machines use the familar Machin head Post and Go stamps, vending the ‘collectors strip’ of 5 values similar to the Wincor-Nixdorf  kiosks but the machine IDs are two digit (instead of  single digit  ) –

machines 21 and 22 are in use.

Examples are available for sale via our Ebay shop or using our ATM shop.

Royal Mail have indicated that as part of the ongoing development of Post & Go they are planning to trial a new machine at Stampex next week in place of the standard Wincor Post and Go machine.

The information provided states “The trial machine will  not provide the usual  self-service functionality and so will be operated by staff at the counter positions. It will only vend a full set of overprints on the Machin design stamps. The overprints have the same typeface as the Wincor offering and so will only appeal to specialist collectors. ”

RM have said that they may be able to offer the pictorial Birds 2 version as well depending on availability of a second machine and space constraints.

Information continues stating “We are trialling the machine with a view to installation in Tallents House to provide a more effective offering to the trade when larger quantities are required for new issues. Depending on the suitability of the machines they may also be installed in post offices at some point in the future but there is no planned installation programme to date.”

So a very interesting Stampex in store for postage label collectors- Watch this space for the latest new on these developments..

In what appears to be  software changes to the Post Office counter printer software, which became visible around 30th December 2010, the “date seperator” overprinted on the Horizon Postage label has changed from ‘-‘  back to its ‘Horizon’ setting of   ‘/’. Thus giving a new date format of dd/mm/yy.

As well as the chnages to the format of the printed date , this change appears also to have had the effect in some Welsh branches  with the bilingual version of the overprint of causing the ‘l’ of Post Brenhinol (The Welsh equivalent of ‘Royal Mail’)  to be omitted from all labels printed in those offices that print the Bilingual version of the Horizon Postage Label in Wales. This has resulted in labels issued with the text  “Post Brenhino ”

It will be interesting to see how long this configuration lasts. Watch this space..

Machin Head Post and Go stamps have been dispensed from Wincor-Nixdorf kiosks in the UK since 2008.
There are two versions of the print – one printed by the kiosk at Post Offices across the UK and another press-printed version of the original font set available from the Philatelic Bureau at Tallents House in a presentation card.
The labels can be obtained with 5 different service indicators: 1st class & 1st class Large up to 100gr, Europe up to 20gr, Worldwide up to 10gr and 20gr, singly or in strips of up to 5 of the same value or various values.
For those that are printed by machine there are two further versions of the oveprint- original and updated font (see below) , for these we supply a strip of the five different values currently available in a special ‘collectors strip’ and offer a choice of machine code (when available) and font.

LEFT- ORIGINAL FONT

Yesterday (Sept 13th)  was the first day of sale for the much anticipated  new Gold Imperforate Horizon labels in Chesterfield.. A first day cover is shown ..