Dear Ralph,
I refer to your editor's comments in the August 1997 issue of ITe. cards has been erratic: is it not possible to have a correspondent who
Your magazine has become a bit of a do-it-yourself bulletin board.
I don't see many articles researched and published by your own staff?
One subject that would be of benefit to subscribers and advertisers
alike, is some in-depth articles with examples, on what is available for
storing spare cards.
You advertised some time ago that you would be having a regular
catalogue feature in the magazine. What happened to it? The problem
every collector faces, is finding out what cards they are missing.
The main thing holding back the spread of telephone card
collecting is the lack of publicity on phone card collecting, and the
lack of reference works on what has been issued. Until we get our
own world catalogue we are going to be a fringe hobby. Perhaps you
can persuade someone to take on this task?
8T produces and releases telephone cards to use in their tele-
phone boxes. Why, oh why, do they need to produce special cards
just for the collectors market? We need YOU, the trade magazine to
pressure 8T into becoming a responsible card provider (like France
Telecom) who only produce cards to satisfy genuine Telephone
demand. Who needs special limited edition cards? BT and byasso-
ciation the whole United Kingdom, will become a joke amongst tele-
phone card collectors who will reinforce the message:'No BT cards'-
please. What other organisation has the gall to issue a card with a
printed face value of £1.00 and which gives you £2.00 worth of
service, and then demands you pay £8.60 for the privilege?
I hear stories of older and rare telephone cards being sold for quite
substantial sums of money. Why are these sales never reported?
Auctions are advertised in your magazine. Have you asked for
feedback of information on sales made?
Yours sincerely,
T.I. Hayward, England
Many thanks for your letter - I'm sorry that you feel ITe is becoming
a 'bul/etin board' - but we cannot afford to employ a massive research
staff (unless you can encourage millions more to subscribe!).
However, your suggestion about an article on storage methods is
very apt - and we shal/ see what we can do.
As to catalogues, we have reinstated this section in the current
issue - I hope it meets your requirements. If not, please Ie me know.
The possibility of a world catalogue, to replace that of Hiscocks',
seems an impossibility - or could you manage it? Whilst others echo
your feelings on BT, i am not sure that France Telecom is the best
comparison: they have a hefty charge for private cards, don't make
them available for six months, never delete private cards from their
list (despite complaints from dealers and col/ectors over many years
that they are 'destroying the market) and they don't feel col/ectors to
be important.
Finally, I am surprised by your comments on auctions: we have an
auction report each month and that has been wel/ received. If you
know of any auctions we are missing - do, please, let us know.
Dear Ralph,
First of all may I apologise for writing to you in long hand: it is due
partly to illness and partly to a heat wave.
Your predecessor, Mark, contacted me asking for contributions and
I have, so far, obliged twice.
However, the information you have published recently on new
will inform you of the latest issues in a responsible and regular manner?
Perhaps new issues could be presented in much the same way as
stamps are in the 'new issues' sections of stamp magazines? Greek
cards now appear in avalanches and one can be drowned by the
quantity. However, the last time you showed cards from this country,
the details were merely translated from the Greek and there was little
help for the thematic collector. In particular, there were no pictures.
Your readers may like to know that Greek phone cards issued prior
to 1995 have now all been made invalid; new issues (from 01/97)
expire two years after the original date of issue. Two special Greek
cards, and a Danish one, were made available at the Second
International Phonecard Fair, held in Athens in June: many foreign
dealers were there. It was also possible to obtain, free of charge,
three dummy cards.
In February Greece issued her first Coca-Cola card for the Xanthi
Carnival (Coca-Cola sponsored the event and there is a tiny ad.
visible on the special card. 1,650,000 of these Schlumberger cards
were produced with two control numbers: 31 19 and 3120).
Why was it necessary to devote four whole pages to The Fifth
Element in the luly issue: was it a promotion - if so, why could there
not have been an associated competition?
Also in the luly issue, (on page 13) you show an Albanian card with
a map of that country. In fact, if you look closely, you can see that this
is, in fact, a map of Greece! (perhaps all the refugees here are big users
of phone cards! They are certainly a valuable source for collectors).
I should like to congratulate you on the excellent article on Italian
cards by Andrea Lughi. I hope we can have more like that.
Best regards,
Mrs Nan Papaidannou, Greece.
Thank you very much for sending so many comments. I hope that, by
now, you are feeling better and that the heat-wave is over (we have also
been suffering from one here). I shall try to answer all your questions.
First, many thanks for your own contributions: we get little infor-
mation about Greek cards: perhaps, you would like to fol/ow Mark's
suggestion and become our Greek correspondent? We publish as
much information on new issues as we receive: if there are no
pictures, it is because none were supplied (as with your information
above on the Fair cards!! But see this month's Globe Trotting). The
Albanian set is, indeed, a mystery and last month we mentioned this
in the World News section.
Other people have also suggested that we fol/ow the example of
stamp magazines: but, unlike stamps, phone cards are total/y uncon-
trol/ed and no one even knows who is issuing the world's cards, let
alone which ones, and how many, are coming out: imagine the Greek
'avalanche' being multiplied several hundred times! Even if we could
produce such a list, the magazine would become so expensive that
no one could afford to buy it!
The Fifth Element article appeared because we had to find a substi-
tute at short notice for a feature which did not tum up. Although I wrote
the piece myself, I agree, .In retrospect, that it was not perfect. There was
no promotion involved: I wrote the article after seeing the film.
Thanks for your comments on the Italian Globe Trotting feature.
We shall try to have more articles like it - could you do something
similar for Greece?