Me and my partner live in a rented flat, so we’ve always received letters for quite a few different people who we don’t know. But recently (last few months) we started receiving a crazy amount of letters for one specific name. It’s up now to probably 15-20 letters every couple of days (this is a stack of 37 letters taken out of the post box in the last 3 days).
From the ones that give away anything on the outside of the envelope I can see quite a few seem to be car related (parking charges, clean air zone fines) but I don’t even know what a person could do to receive this many letters from anywhere. To make it even weirder someone came to our door a whole ago saying they were The Name and used to live here, and asked if we had ever received any post for them and told us they live in another flat in the same building but haven’t ever come back or asked again and we’ve lived here for years!
Is this some kind of weird scam? Is there a benefit someone could have to having something registered to our address? Has anyone else experienced this?
by eeeegirl
33 comments
some ones using your address.
prepare.
It’s clearly not a mistake if you’re getting that many. Open them, find out, and contact whoever is sending them to say XYZ doesn’t live here and don’t contact me again
I’d just open some and phone the companies to tell them then chuck the rest back in the post box with return to sender.
If they’re fines then I’d be contacting the police to make a record of it.
Possibly a scam, or a new neighbour who has incorrectly been filling out the wrong address. Had a new neighbour a couple of years ago do this, and we got all of their mail.
Return to sender, wrong address
If there’s a sender address on the envelopes (like on the back/corners), the easiest thing is, on each envelope, cross out your address, write “NO LONGER AT THIS ADDRESS” next to it and then put them all back into a postbox.
Write NOT AT THIS ADDRESS and put it into a postbox. If they don’t believe you, report it to the post office. This will block the letters being sent.
You’re flats ‘identity’ has been stolen. Right on every letter ‘not know at this address’ and ‘return to sender’ and put them in a post box. Then contact the DVLA and inform them that whoever has registered a driving license or car at your address doesn’t live there and is commuting fraud.
I had it when a Uni student moved in to a similar sounding address to mine and accidentally put mine down for everything – it’s the time of year for that to potentially happen?
I spent a few quid on one of those anonymiser rollers to cover the address and a “No longer resident at this address” stamp. Now it takes seconds to go through and get them ready to drop in the next post box you see.
Open them and find out
You need to let Harry know and let him go to wizarding school. If not this will continue indefinitely.
All you can do is write “NOT KNOWN AT THIS ADDRESS” and return
Is the electoral roll correct at your property?
There’s likely a fraudulent/criminal business which has listed your address as theirs. The lad at your door was probably looking to pick up a cheque or another piece of important correspondence.
It’s not worth panicking about, but as others have said, most important thing is to inform the Post Office (“NOT AT THIS ADDRESS”). Consider contacting police non-emergency (101) so that you have evidence that you’re not complicit if you’re ever framed for anything.
The previous tenant has had their car number plate cloned by someone who is using it to dodge ulez/congestion charges. The victim hasn’t changed their address with the dvla so the letters are going to their registered address, yours.
It’ll be fairly straightforward to prove you are not they, by forwarding a copy of your tenancy agreement to the dvla along with one of the letters which “arrived damaged and the letter fell out, which you accidently read.”
This is a common scam these days, countless people post photos of their cars on enthusiast groups allowing people to make plates for similar cars with little effort needed to find a suitable number plate, they just need to join the right group for their car and pick one matching the paint colour and model.
If you do get to talk to the previous tenant/victim, they may be best advised to buy a cheap private plate and put it on their car, thus stopping the fines and having the residual effect of the scammer driving around on a deregistered plate, making them a big beacon to police and anpr cameras.
The letters are one thing, but a man that you don’t recognise comes knocking on your door claiming to be the former tenant and that he still lives in the building? That is a major, major red flag.
Check to see if the person’s name or your address is registered to a company on Companies House – if so you should absolutely report it to Cheatline or IFED as it could be someone trying to set up fake IDs for organised fraud purposes.
Stuff like this is usually an early warning sign for fake companies being incorporated to set up bank accounts for money laundering or other financial crime.
Edit: [Companies House search is here](https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/) for those who need it
It’s probably someone using your address for a fraudulent purpose, that’s normally the case in this situation.
Postie here, happens more often than you’d think.
Usually an error on behalf on sender, rarely sinister or deliberate.
I’d advise opening one & contacting sender to inform them this person is unknown.
You *can* pop them in a postbox with return to sender on but to be honest it doesn’t stop it – sender doesn’t care and bins it, better to speak to someone or email.
Unfortunately it’s not up to Royal Mail/your postie, we deliver to address not person so if another 20 arrive then we have to deliver them even if we know it’s not for you.
The onus is on sender and they’ll just keep pumping them out until it becomes the responsibility of someone there.
Frustrating, time consuming & not your problem yet you’ve been pulled into it 🙄
This is the way.
Edit: as someone else says, it’s not on you to provide any personal information to the sender, just to state you are not them thank you very much.
With that many letters being delivered out of the blue id be opening a few to understand what’s going on.
When ULEZ was brought in in London, someone registered their fleet of non compliant vans to our address with the dvla and we were getting 50 fine letters a day by the time the DVLA would answer our calls.
Open them, who’s gonna know?
British gas do this to me every year. I’ve reported it for 2 years. I don’t even have an account with them. But they send between 20-50 letters, all identical over a couple of weeks.
I’m sure I saw this post last week 🧐
r/RBI
You are fine to open the letters to find out who’s been sending them so you can contact them and let them know the address is wrong. You’re only breaking the law if you open someone else’s post in order to commit fraud (paraphrasing here).
Returning to sender doesn’t always work, so contacting the senders yourself might force them to actually look into it
A collection agency has probably acquired someone’s historical debt, checked the last known address and then letter bombed it.
Maybe somebody’s trying to contact him about his extended warranty
OP, whatever happens, if anyone turns up at your door again asking for their post, do not give it to them. Tell them you’ve posted them all back to the sender, and make sure you’ve actually done that. Don’t give the post to that person because it will enable them to carry on with a fraudulent situation. It’s really important to return all this post every week, and yes it does work, just that it’ll take a while because some senders need to be told several times before they listen.
Check your credit, in case your address has been used.
Sounds like someone has given out your address, probably with a fake name to register vehicle, and who knows what else.
Sounds like someone has registered a car at that address and is speeding, ignoring fines etc.
Report them.
jeezy petes that’s a big stack
Given that you can see the letters are for parking fines etc., someone has given your address as the location of the registered keeper of a vehicle (or vehicles) whilst they swan around breaking all kinds of rules, probably on false plates as well.
You need to sort this out, otherwise you’re going to have a string of bailiffs turning up at your door at all hours very soon, and for each one you’ll have to convince them that you’re not the person they want (which should be easy to do, but gets irritating when yet another bailiff turns up at 6am in an attempt to catch you in).
Contact 101 and explain that you think someone is using your address for criminal purposes.