Junk mail goes to HDB doorsteps

Unwanted ‘visitors’ are popping up on the doorsteps of HDB flats.

They are fliers hawking services from cooking gas to tuition, and even stickers which may be glued to front gates.

In the past, advertisers paid runners to slot fliers into letterboxes located at void decks.

But since anti-junk mail locking devices have been installed – which do not allow for slotting – advertisers have resorted to other methods.

These practices have not gone down well with residents like Madam Dolly Goh, 60.

‘My letterbox has the lock function, but now fliers are left on the gate of my flat. Such fliers are a waste of material and effort as I do not act on them,’ said the housewife who lives in the Bedok Reservoir area.

At least one town council is doing something to curb the practice.

Jurong Town Council is giving space to advertisers via notice boards. It has installed them in the lift lobbies in the town centre and in some residential blocks.

The council allows advertisers to put up their fliers free, for 30 days.

Six to 10 A4-sized advertisements can be placed on the notice board. The advertisements commonly seen are those from tuition centres and property agents.

A Sunday Times check with the advertisers found that this method has helped their businesses, with more potential customers making inquiries.

But one advertiser, a property agent who did not want to be named, said he still occasionally gets people to deliver fliers door-to-door.

Mr Ho Thian Poh, general manager of Jurong Town Council, acknowledges that fliers and notices continue to be pasted in common areas like lift landings.

‘Our staff will call and advise them accordingly,’ he said, referring to the action taken against the advertisers.

Currently, 80 per cent of the letterboxes in the Jurong area have the anti-junk mail device.

But Mrs Jennifer Yip, 58, a human resource administrator who lives in Bukit Batok Central, is puzzled over why she continues to get junk mail.

‘My mailbox has the lock but somehow the fliers still get in,’ she said.

According to Mr Ho, several advertisers engage SingPost to deliver their fliers through a bulk mail system called Admail.

SingPost has an opt-out service which prevents unaddressed promotional mail from ending up in letterboxes.

You can request to be taken off the Admail service by calling SingPost’s hotline on 6845-6210.

Since 1995, letterboxes in new HDB blocks have been built with the anti-junk mail device.

Letterboxes in older blocks are also being progressively upgraded with the device.

Source: Sunday Times, 3 Jan 2010