How do you get your mail and parcels when you are on the road long term?
It is a common question that many aspiring caravan travellers ask. This article addresses this important question and offers various options in this regard.
Do I Still Need A Mailing Address If I Travel Full-Time?
Your caravan can easily serve the purpose of a small independent house and offer all the basic comforts of a home, especially when you are travelling. However, if you plan to be on the road for many weeks or even months at a stretch, you may have to address some pertinent issues.
One of these issues is accessing your mail. If you do not have proper arrangements in place to take care of this deceivingly basic aspect, you may soon realize how inconvenient this can be.
While some forms of correspondence can wait, you must have arrangements to receive important letters or documents from your bank, insurance company, passport office, and credit card provider.
Besides important documents, you may also need to recover something you left behind at a campsite or get something you cannot do without. In such an instance, package forwarding is unavoidable.
However, if you are on the road for a long period or do not have a pre-planned route, package forwarding may be tough to tackle, and you may need to make proper arrangements for mail access.
How Can I Access My Mail While Travelling?
Technology has advanced considerably, but all forms of mail cannot be delivered digitally. The trend of using snail mail is still in practice, and you may need to retrieve mail or packages in multiple instances.
There are various ways to receive your mail when travelling across the UK, including a local post office and mail redirect. You can also use the addresses of your friends, family, or caravan parks. Once you have devised a proper system accessing your mail will become easy and hassle-free.
Let’s look at a few options you can consider to access your mail when you are caravanning long-term.
Send Mail To Somebody Else While Travelling
If you do not plan to be away for long and are not expecting anything important in the meanwhile, you can request the local post office to hold back your mail until you get back. However, if you are planning a longer trip, you may need to have someone collect your mail.
For instance, if someone from your friends’ circle or family lives close by, you can ask them to check your mailbox every other day or so. You can also make arrangements with the Post Office to have all of your mail diverted to your friend or family member’s house. They can keep the mail for you or forward it to you as required.
If you have a trustworthy friend or relative who is also willing to manage your mail for you, the arrangement could work very well.
Receive Mail Electronically While Travelling
When it comes to certain forms of correspondence, you can always opt for the digital route. For instance, if you have been conducting your financial transactions manually, you can switch to online banking and inform your bank to send you correspondence to your digital address.
Similarly, other billing forms can be shifted online, like your utility bills, credit card bills, insurance fees, etc. You can make arrangements for them before you embark on your trip.
Use A Mail Forwarding Service While Travelling
Another option you can consider for long-term caravanning, especially if you are expecting to receive a lot of mail during that time, is to get a mail forwarding service. There are plenty of options around the UK and Europe that can forward or redirect mail on your behalf for a small fee.
These services usually hold your letters or parcels until you provide a forwarding address. They can also open the mail, scan It and send the contents of the message via email.
One such service (and the one we’ve used for a long time now) is UK Postbox. UK Postbox offers mail management services for people on the move. You can use the UK Postbox to benefit from its online mail management features, including reading, storing, or forwarding your mail online.
You will be given a permanent address that you can use for all your correspondence. The service offers private mail sorting facilities, ensuring that all your mail is managed in a safe and secure way and your privacy is intact.
Moreover, you can also send urgent letters via UK Postbox. If you are in a place with no post office or post-box nearby, you can request them to send the letter on your behalf. UK Postbox offers different mail packages depending on your mail usage and frequency of receiving mail.
UK Postbox also offers a PO Box address in major UK cities. If there is a parcel that you need to receive, the service’s free PO Box account includes a courier point address which you can use for parcels or packages. Just have the parcel sent to UK Postbox and inform the service how you would like it handled.
If you’re interested in learning more about UK PostBox click here, we wouldn’t be without them now.
Poste Restante
You can also have your post sent to a local post office for collection. If you plan to be staying at a certain location away from home in the caravan or expect to be moving around in a certain place, you can opt for a service called poste restante.
The service allows mail to be delivered to a post office from where the mail addresses can collect it.
However, not all outlets offer the service, so you may need to check. To avail of the poste restante service, you must make prior arrangements. Go to your local Post Office with ID proof and inform them that you will be travelling and want to have your mail sent there so you can collect it.
If they agree, enter the designated Post Office as the forwarding address and check on the Poste Restante box. You can use the service at one office for up to three months, and if you plan to stay longer, you can switch to another.
You can pick up your mail during normal business hours. While you do not have to pay anything to collect your mail, make sure to bring along some form of ID so that you can collect your mail conveniently.
