Royal Mail’s app lets customers detect counterfeit stamps

Royal Mail has launched a scanner tool in its app that lets customers check if a stamp is counterfeit.

Following a row over £5 “fines” being levied on people who received a letter carrying an allegedly fake stamp, Royal Mail has also announced a new independent arbitrator to settle disputes about whether a stamp is genuine or not.

Since the start of August last year, only new stamps with scannable barcodes have been valid for postage.

In the months that followed, people who received letters were forced to pay a £5 penalty fee in cases where Royal Mail suspected that a counterfeit stamp had been used by the sender.

Some customers whose letters were affected claimed that the stamps used were bought from Post Office branches, reputable retailers, or even Royal Mail’s own website.

There have also been claims that realistic fake stamps mass-produced in China are being sold online and bought unwittingly by the public and smaller retailers.

With the row gathering momentum, Royal Mail suspended the £5 penalty charges in April and said on Tuesday that it would “extend the pause” on the collection of the fee for those receiving letters carrying counterfeit stamps.

It has also added a new scanner to its free-to-use app that will enable people to check if a stamp is a known fake, thereby preventing them from “inadvertently becoming victims of fraud”.

Once the barcode on the stamp is scanned, the customer will be told whether or not it is counterfeit. If people did not buy their stamps from Royal Mail, a post office or another reputable outlet, they are being advised to scan them to make sure they are genuine.

Meanwhile, the new independent arbitrator – an expert from the stamp dealer Stanley Gibbons – will make the final decision in cases where a surcharge is disputed by the customer and the complaint has reached deadlock. The expert will examine the stamp and his or her decision “will be fully independent of Royal Mail and the judgment binding”.

The company said that since the introduction of barcoded stamps it had seen a 90% fall in use of fake stamps.

It added that the “temporary” suspension of the surcharge would be kept under review. In the meantime, it will continue to slap stickers on letters if it believes the stamps used are counterfeit.