[clousseau]

On Friday I received a letter that had a small tear at the top of the envelope. It was an A4 size envelope containing official translations of documents from Bordeaux, with "Lettre Prioritaire" stamps on it.

This is the second time I have received a letter with such a tear, since arriving here in December last year.

I suspect, though I hope not unfairly. someone has tampered with the envelope to see if there is any cash inside?

Clouseau

 

[Bevdeforges]

I was going to say that if you have a letter going from Bordeaux to Adelaide, it was a long trip and it's probably not impossible that there was simply some damage to the envelope. But then I see you're in France now - so that isn't it.

I suppose the key thing is: was there anything missing from the envelope? I don't know if you can assume that someone was looking for cash, because my husband tells me that it used to be illegal to send cash through the French Poste. That seems to have changed (when? no idea) but it's not common in any event and I kind of doubt postal workers or anyone else would normally assume that envelopes "might" have cash in them.

I know our postman is pretty good about mentioning when he delivers anything (usually a package) that has been damaged in transit (and usually the box or packaging is patched up with official Poste tape) and he has on occasion insisted that I open the box immediately to make sure there is no damage to the contents.

If you're worried about it, you can always take the envelope in to the local Poste and show them what happened. If there was actually damage to the contents and/or anything missing, they should be able to tell you what your options are.
Cheers,
Bev

 

[clousseau]

Thank you Bev.
This is the second or third time this has happened to incoming mail since we moved to France in December. I paid 90 euros for the contents of this envelope, official court translations of documents I need to convert my licence from a South Australian one to a French one. I have not opened the envelope but I can see that one of the documents is slightly damaged. I am going to take the envelope and some strong words to the village Post Office on Tuesday (they're closed on Monday). After that I may well take the envelope to the Gendarmerie. This is no accidental damage. I strongly suspect this is tampering with intent to steal. This same thing used to happen to me 40 years ago when I lived in Morocco! It is outrageous and undermines one's faith in the integrity and security of the postal service.

 

[Stevesolar]

Maybe Cato did it!









Seriously - we used to get lots of tampered mail in the UK, when we ran an internet shop. Despite explicit instructions not to send cash - many people did and it was often missing from the envelope - with one end of the envelope craftily slit open. It could have only been done by dishonest postal workers.

 

[clousseau]

"Cato has been doing some cooking for me, but lately he's started attacking me without warning."

 

[95995]

But you said a small tear, so I'm wondering how small is 'small'. Big enough to extract documents or to really check what's inside? I would go initially to La Poste and make a formal complaint with them if you have genuine concerns, and then (if no reasonable explanation or investigation already underway) on to the gendarmerie to 'porter plainte'. From what you say, it seems nothing is missing. Have any of your neighbours had a similar experience? Sometimes the automated machinery can cause damage when an envelope gets a bit stuck. (I've had far worse issues in Australia, BTW, not that that is any consolation.)

Certainly there have been instances in France where postal workers have tampered with or stolen or simply held onto mail, so it's not impossible that your mail has been tampered with.

 

[DejW]

Yes, go to la poste,and perhaps the gendarmerie.

I have a little experience of this sort of thing with the UK postal service. They take theft very seriously and have an investigation branch equipped with all sorts of tools to sniff out who, where, how? If they receive one complaint of theft.....oh well, that happens. If they get several....same sender or same receiver, same type of envelope/parcel then they act. With experience they can narrow it down to either the sending office, sorting offices, or the individual postman. And then "mind your fingers, clang" as the cell door slams shut.

Tampered post is annoying, worrying and stressful , so I hope you get it fixed.

DejW