Rules for Sending Postcards as "Printed Matter"

The history of postcards used in Finland start from the 1871. Quite early, in 1867, printed matter was assigned a lower postal rate compared to a letter rate. Postcards followed their own rate which was lower than letter rate but higher than the rate for printed matter.

Quickly in the late 19th century it became obvious that postcards were an excellent form of communication between parties that only wanted to greet each other, send their condolences or other brief and concise wishes. However, the postal rate of regular postcards was prohibitive of this. So ... postal authorities in Finland then devised a set of rules that would allow postcards to be sent with a lower printed matter rate if the postcard's content followed a defined set of rules.

The actual dates of when this became in effect is not clear. Also the initial rules of how this classification was precisely enforced are lost in time (or archives). However, the main point of these rules were that the postcard was not excessively textual (limited in words) and that the information contained within it could not be construed as correspondence in any way. If the text would include something along the lines of "I will arrive by the evening train." it would be classified as correspondence and the postcard disqualified for being printed matter. Allowed maximum textual content varied by time but in the early years of the 20th century it was five words. 

This peculiar method required that the postcards were read by postal officials with understanding of how these rules were enforced. It also meant that ingenious people started to use abbreviations to fit more information into the postcard. One such abbreviation was "O.U.V." which was interpreted as one word by the rules but was actually an abbreviation of the words "Onnellista uutta vuotta" literally translated as "Happy New Year". The maximum number of words did not count the sender's name or title and somewhat unclear was what other common words were "discounted" (such as "terveisin" and "toivoo" which are roughly equivalent as "Sincerely yours", "Your's truly" or "Best wishes by"). It is possible there were temporal and also regional fluctuations how these were treated.

Despite the obvious clunkiness of such a system it was resilient enough to last for decades. In the 1980's the maximum word count was 10 words and finally in the 1984 printed matter as a separate mail category in Finland was removed and this system was then abolished. In 1984 postal authorities introduced a new category - 2nd class mail - which then took the place of greeting cards but without the need to enforce any stupid rules regarding the written text. 

Also of note is that printed matter letters containing postcards are known. Many letters were sent abroad that had the postcard inside an envelope and the envelope was purposefully left unsealed. This allowed the letter to be sent as printed matter because now the postal authorities were able to ascertain the postcard followed the rules without breaking a sealed envelope! 

Examples

A greeting card sent 18.3.1936. Postcard rate was 1,25 marks. Rate as printed matter was 0,50 marks. A significant save for sending simple greetings.