Aerogram
An aerogram is a " light air mail letter " or " air mail folded letter ". It is a single, pre-printed sheet of very thin airmail paper (today most countries use DIN A4 as the basic format and thicker paper than in the past), which has to be folded in a certain way and sealed around the gummed areas. In the early aerograms, the sheet of paper was usually divided into four fields by two folds. Later on, in many countries, the arch was divided into three fields by two parallel folds; In this case, one A4 page can be written on completely and one third of the other page can be written on. Aerograms must not contain any deposits. Because they are so light, the postage is often lower than for other forms of mail.
Aerograms can appear as postal stationery with imprinted postage or as forms that are postage paid. While aerograms are mainly used for international communication, in some countries such as India or Nepal, domestic aerograms were also issued as postal stationery.
In Germany, the aerogram was discontinued as a form of mail on January 1, 2007; previously the postage was 1.00 euros. For mail within Europe, the standard letter Europe was cheaper anyway at 0.70 euros. Since then, mail outside of Europe has to be franked as a standard global letter (0.75 euros; maximum 20 grams, 235 × 125 × 5 millimeters).
Currently, there is no longer any differentiation behind the German border. The product Standard Letter International has cost € 1.10 since July 1, 2019.
The dimensions for an aerogram are between 140 and 220 millimeters in length and 90 to 110 millimeters in width. The weight must not exceed five grams.
In some countries special aerograms were issued for soldiers and prisoners of war , with a reduced postage rate or postage exemption. For example, Great Britain issued aerograms for field post under the name "Forces Letter" in World War II. (See also: V-Mail .)
For many overseas or remote areas, aerograms are still important. Aerograms belong to the stamp collecting area. Many country and motif collectors like to add the few aerograms that are available from almost every country in the world to their collections as a special supplement and decoration. But there are also airmail collectors who have specialized entirely in the unusual collecting field of “aerograms”. For aerograms, which are postal stationery, there are on the one hand special aerogram catalogs and on the other hand cataloging in general postal stationery catalogs. For many countries, there is no systematic cataloging of aerogram forms that have to be postage paid.
Aerograms have different names around the world:
Aerograms - Aerogram - Aerogram Luchtpostblad - Airmail light letter - Air Letter - Par Avion - Airmail - Flygpost
Due to the development of the internet and email , the use of aerograms is declining.
Web links
- Exemplary philatelic collection of aerograms ( memento from October 30, 2013 in the Internet Archive )