House mailbox
A house mailbox or private mailbox is a mailbox into which deliverers throw mail in order to deliver them to the recipient. They are used to store the mail in a protected manner in the absence of the recipient and to be able to carry out the delivery quickly. Private mailboxes can, for example, be placed in the hallway of apartment buildings, embedded in the house facade or door, mounted on the house facade or in front of the house on a frame or attached to the property line on a post.
history
According to some information, wooden boxes, called tamburi , were placed in the churches of Florence in the 16th century , in which the population could submit anonymous reports for the government to warn them of attacks and crimes. Later these boxes were said to have been used by the mail carriers to have also dropped the mail that was addressed to the clergy there. So these mailboxes are more the ancestors of today's house mailboxes.
For apartment buildings in Austria in the 19th and early 20th centuries, it was common for the porter to receive and deliver the mail for all tenants, similar to the French concierge . In the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, a subsidy of DM 10 per mailbox was paid to the house owner by the Deutsche Bundespost for German multi-family houses if, instead of the door mailboxes, house mailboxes were attached to the individual apartment doors on the ground floor, which saved the delivery person from climbing stairs . In rural areas, mailboxes on the houses did not establish themselves until after the Second World War , especially since the classic housewife was usually present during the day and could receive mail.
In single-family houses, a throw-in flap is sometimes let into the front door. Sometimes the mail can simply fall to the floor inside without being caught by a container. In the past, tenement houses were often equipped with several individual mailboxes in the hallway. Today, so-called mailbox systems are used instead, which combine several mailboxes in one housing. Throw-through systems embedded next to the front door enable insertion from the outside and removal from the inside.
Dimensions
|
DIN EN 13724 |
|---|---|
| Area | Postal services |
| title | Throwing openings in house mailboxes |
| Brief description: | Requirements and tests |
| Latest edition | 2016-08 |
| ISO | / |
In the European Union , minimum dimensions and other requirements for mailboxes are regulated in EN 13724. The minimum size is based, among other things, on a test envelope in C4 paper format . This must be able to be thrown in without any problems and without any damage. The slot opening must be at least 30 mm high and 230 mm wide. There are already a number of proceedings in which a rent reduction due to non-compliance with the standard (minimum size) has been confirmed in court. Landlords try to refuse claims to a letterbox according to the current standard if the old letterbox was accepted when moving in, but courts still awarded tenants a rent reduction because when renting an apartment you don't first look at how big the letterbox is. A tenant does not accept a defective mailbox as such by renting the apartment alone; according to § 535 , § 536 BGB , there is a right to the installation of a mailbox according to the current standard.
Delivery and collection in a letter box
Germany
In contrast to normal house mailboxes, the “house mailboxes in the country” (type EB100K), now called Landbriefkasten by Deutsche Post AG , are made available to postal customers free of charge if they live more than 100 meters from the public road network. They are used in rural delivery areas that have been handled when the recipients of mail live away from the paved road in houses or yards that cannot be reached by motor vehicle or can only be reached under difficult conditions. The letter boxes are attached to the country road mainly on pillars, less on buildings, etc. You serve
- the deliverer to insert the letters and parcels intended for the owner of the respective letterbox and
- the box owner to insert his outgoing mail.
The mailbox is emptied and the outgoing mail is forwarded by the deliverer on the next delivery trip. For this reason, the locks of this type are equipped with main locks. They were originally pressed from polyester resin dyed mouse-gray and are provided with a lid (mailbox roof) for emptying and equipped with a name plate and a deposit indicator. The deposit indicator can optionally be operated by the box owner and shows the deliverer that there are outgoing mail items in the box. The letter slot is on the front.
Deutsche Post AG offers three different models: "Ludwig red", "Knut" in green and "Sam", which is in the style of American tin mailboxes.
In October 2008, Deutsche Post AG tested the collection from private mailboxes for all customers. In contrast to the “house mailbox in the country”, however, the “postman service” was chargeable. A monthly flat rate of € 4.99 was charged.
From autumn 2013, DHL tested parcel boxes, which are installed on the customer's premises like letter boxes. The first test area was in Ingolstadt . These parcel letter boxes can be used for both dispatch and receipt by Deutsche Post DHL. Since the tests were very well received, the parcel box has been available nationwide since May 2014. The box can either be rented for at least 1.99 euros per month or optionally purchased. Other postal service providers are not allowed to use DHL parcel boxes. In March 2015, DHL announced that it wanted to set up such parcel stations in apartment buildings together with housing companies so that tenants could receive and send parcels.
In Germany currently (August 2015) Lockbox and Locumi offer vendor-independent parcel boxes, i.e. those that accept parcels from any delivery company. A coalition of Hermes, GLS and DPD was founded with the aim of bringing out provider-independent parcel boxes.
United States
In the United States , it is common practice to place your outgoing mail in your own private home mailbox rather than in a public mailbox. To do this, the owner moves a kind of flag up on the mailbox so that the deliverer knows that he will find items to be taken there when he delivers the daily mail. This system is identical to the German “house letter boxes in the country”.
There are also normal post boxes .
Legal
There is no obligation to hold a mailbox in front of you. However, if no one is found during delivery and there is no mailbox or similar receiving device, items can be treated as undeliverable. The property owner is liable for damage that occurs when the deliverer moves around the property and is the result of a breach of the duty to maintain safety or the obligation to clear and spread .
Post universal service regulation
According to § 2 number 4 sentence 2 of the Post-Universaldienstleistungsverordnung (PUDLV), delivery to the "residential or business address specified in the address must either be thrown into a sufficiently receptive device intended for the recipient for receiving letters or by handing over personally to the recipient ". If this is not possible, the deliverer is allowed to deliver the consignment "if possible to a substitute recipient". If the "home or business address of the recipient can only be reached with disproportionate difficulty or if there is no suitable and accessible device for receiving letters, the recipient can be excluded from delivery". The person concerned must be informed about this.
Employment Law
The Schleswig-Holstein State Labor Court ruled on October 13, 2015 (2 Sa 149/15) that employees are not obliged to check their mailboxes for new mail on Sundays. The reason for this was the delayed delivery of a notice of termination during the trial period.
See also
- Deadline mailbox
- Dead mailbox
- Post office box
- packing station
- Parcel station
- Milk box
- Unwanted advertising
literature
- Handheld dictionary of postal services
-
German Society for Postal and Telecommunication History (DGPT), publisher and publisher:
- Archive for German Postal History
- Karl Dopf: The mailbox tells its story . Frankfurt / Main, 1965, no. 2, p. 63
- Archive for German Postal History
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Karl Dopf, p. 63
- ↑ Letters on the ground floor . In: Der Spiegel . No. 42 , 1957 ( online ).
- ↑ Everyone their own postman - 4500 steps a day unreasonable - Post's heart's desire: house letterboxes . In: Die Zeit , No. 19/1957.
- ↑ Summary of DIN EN 13724 at a manufacturer . Retrieved December 2, 2014.
- ↑ Landgericht Berlin, judgment of May 11, 1990, Az. 29 S 20/90
- ^ AG Charlottenburg, judgment of May 16, 2001, Az. 27 C 262/00
- ↑ The tenant is not entitled to a specific mailbox size ( page can no longer be accessed , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ News from Elbenberg: What a small "slit" can do ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ Housing deficiencies and rent reduction, published by BMV 1996
- ^ AG Charlottenburg, Az. 27 C 262/00
- ↑ a b The “Ludwig rot” model is right at the top of the popularity list in Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung , published on January 30, 2001
- ↑ Concise dictionary of the postal system; 3. Edition; P. 408
- ↑ Figure "Knut" on the manufacturer's website Süd Böhl from Böhl-Iggelheim
- ↑ Country letter boxes ( Memento of the original from February 16, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Press release from Deutsche Post AG
- ↑ Postman will take your letters . Newspaper publisher tz Munich. January 15, 2009. Retrieved February 9, 2010.
- ↑ paket.de
- ↑ DHL Paketkasten available nationwide - The mailbox for parcels is now available for all regions of Germany - Rent from 1.99 EUR per month or buy basic version from 99 EUR Press release from dpdhl.com of May 12, 2014
- ↑ paketkasten.de
- ↑ The parcel box joins the mailbox - if you miss the parcel carrier and no longer want the delivery at your neighbor or even in the branch, you now have an alternative: Deutsche Post DHL is now offering its own parcel box for your front door. faz.net with material from AFP from May 12, 2014
- ↑ Deutsche Post parcel box No more queuing for a Berrit Gräber parcel on sueddeutsche.de from May 14, 2014
- ↑ Now everyone can order the parcel box - Deutsche Post considers it "the greatest invention since the mailbox": The "parcel box" can now be ordered nationwide - and should make many trips to the branch superfluous. AFP / lw welt.de from May 12, 2014
- ↑ "Will not prevail" Post competitors blaspheme against DHL parcel boxes . focus.de, May 15, 2014
- ↑ DHL parcel boxes also for apartment buildings . heise online , March 30, 2015
- ↑ t3n.de
- ↑ Receipt of notice of termination: Employees do not have to look in mailboxes on Sundays . Betriebsratspraxis24.de, November 11, 2015
- ↑ Labor law - on Sundays the mailbox can remain closed . haufe.de, November 13, 2015
