Fake UK stamps blamed on Chinese-made counterfeits
www.bbc.com
People are unknowingly buying fakes from Chinese firms through online marketplaces, reports suggest.

Reports suggest a rise in complaints that stamps bought from legitimate stores are being deemed counterfeit. Anyone who receives a letter with a fake stamp is charged £5 by Royal Mail.

Conservative MP Iain Duncan Smith told BBC Breakfast: “China is behind it.”

A Royal Mail spokesman said: “We are working hard to remove counterfeit stamps from circulation.”

Consumers are being warned to look out for strange perforations around the edge of a stamp, a shine to the surface or the colour looking off.

  • @feedum_sneedsonEnglish
    0•2 months ago

    “China”. Why do they always treat it as a monolith. I have a set of dinner plates… China is behind them.

    • palordrolap
      4•2 months ago

      Because people would lose attention if they tried to use a phrase longer than “China”, and most people on this side of the world wouldn’t know or retain a specific placename in China unless they had specific interest in the country.

      The news could throw something like “Malingshu province” and most people wouldn’t bat an eye.

      … despite the fact that that province name is fake and is in fact a mangled transliteration of one of the Mandarin words for “potato”.

        • palordrolap
          1•2 months ago

          Yeah, that looks like what Google Translate gave me. The old horse-bell yam.

          • @feedum_sneedsonEnglish
            1•2 months ago

            Honestly I am learning Chinese and those kind of bizarre mnemonic devices are the only thing that gets it to stick in your head. Horse with bell on neck eating a potato. I will think of that and remember the word, or at least be part of the way there!