> [...] cards have been misdirected.
> Now my (6Y0A, etc) QSL policy! (Ya get to be DX-- you get to make
> QSL policy.)
K3DI's message inspired me to write a message I have been meaning to
write for a long time, even though it is not contest related per se.
This is the drill for QSOs made while am DX:
My awesome QSL manager AA5BT answers all QSLs for HC8N, WN4KKN/HC8,
N5KO/HC8, WN4KKN/ZP5, yada-yada-yada. AA5BT is the only published
route for these operations these operations, *ever*. I made about
26,000 QSOs from Galapagos in 1996, and every annoucement I made about
my operations included a notice that AA5BT is the QSL manager. I am
truly blessed to have this guy handle my cards, and he has handled
over 10,000 of them to date.
Yet I still receive two or three of these cards every week at my
house. How is this possible? To know that HC8N is really N5KO
requires some kind of effort, like looking the information up
someplace. And virtually everyplace that you would find this info (DX
bulletin, GO-list) will list AA5BT as the manager.
Anyhow, it may sound like I am complaining about this, but really I am
not. There is one particularly important reason (other than the fact
that QSLing is a really miserable chore in volume) I have a QSL
manager: I lose things. Because I am a Swell Guy[tm], I forward these
misrouted cards to my manager (including the bureau cards) every so
often. Sometimes I misplace a few of these cards and they don't get
forwarded until they are rediscovered some months later while sifting
through the various piles of stuff around the house.
[note: this is where the complaining starts]
What really pisses me off is when I read a report in a DX newsletter
from some guy stating it took him 6 months to get an HC8N card after
QSLing direct with an SASE, when it turns it he sent the QSL to me (I
lose things, remember) rather than via the published route. And the
reason it bothers me is that I feel it reflects badly on my manager.
[note: the complaining part is over, and now I am soliciting advice]
So this is how I plan to modify the drill: rather than forwarding
these cards to AA5BT, from now on I will return any misdirected cards
back to the sender, using his SASE of course, with a canned note that
says "Please QSL via AA5BT." This will ensure the sender gets the
promptest possible reply. Does anyone out there have an opinion?
(heh, heh, heh)
--Trey, N5KO
PS: Another moral to this story is that if you are *serious* about
getting a response to a QSL, you should send it direct with SASE or
equivalent. As soon as I receive a bureau shipment, I cull out the
HC8/ZP5/etc cards (many of them say VIA AA5BT but still make it me),
and send them to AA5BT right away. I just got finished sifting
through a backlog of about 8000 bureau cards over the holdays, and I
found a few more that I had overlooked, including some from QSOs made
in 1991. In 1998 we will all read in a DX bulletin that it took seven
years for some poor chap to get his WN4KKN/ZP5 card. Sigh.
--
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