Salisbury Overprints on Second Class Machins

Some of you may be aware of the existence of overprints on second class Hytech Machins from the Salisbury Stamp Fair. No official overprint was sanctioned and this fact was well publicised.

However, Rushstamps decided to produce a souvenir for their customers and purchased 6000 of these stamps and overprinted using a 100 year old printing press. These were then used on mailings to customers. Apparently there are no remaining mint examples and Rushstamps do not intend selling examples.

This sort of activity is to be frowned upon. It sets a precedence which could result in other organisations believing that they, too, could purchase bulk examples of these stamps and print adverts or other messages. Some dealer then might come up with the idea that these were rarities and start to sell them at premium prices. Instead they should be looked on as common stamps defaced by a biro - worthless and only fit for the bin.

I should also point out that by defacing the stamps in this manner, one is essentially invalidating the stamp (cf biro cancels) making it worthless for the prepayment of postage. Therefore, knowingly using such an item to pre-pay postage may be seen by Royal Mail Revenue Protection as a fraud and therefore liable to recovery of postage and even prosecution.