Poste restante

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This PostShop in Auckland, New Zealand, has poste restante service.

Poste restante (French, trans. post which remains) is a service where the post office holds mail until the recipient calls for it. It is a common destination for mail for people who are visiting a particular location and have no need, or no way, of having mail delivered directly to their place of residence at that time.

Mail is addressed to POSTE RESTANTE (or TO BE CALLED FOR), which is written after the full name of the recipient (as appears on the identification to be presented ie. the passport, if abroad), then the name and full address of the destination post office, thus:—

Mr. John Smith

Poste Restante

Islington Post Office

116 Upper Street

Islington

London N1 1AE

If only addressed to a town name, for example POSTE RESTANTE, ISLINGTON (there are currently 115 crown offices in LONDON^[1]) mail will go to the closest main post office branch.

The sender should also include their return address. In the United Kingdom, the Royal Mail holds mail posted from within the UK for two weeks, whereas mail posted from abroad is normally held for one month, if the recipient is at sea however, it will be held for two months. Where mail is not collected within that time, it will be returned to the sender, or if there is no sender indicated, will be treated as undeliverable. If the sender would like uncollected mail returned sooner, they can indicate this on the envelope. Timescales vary from country to country according to local practice.

In the United States, the US Postal Service uses the term general delivery and reserves the term poste restante for international mail sent to general delivery. Mail is addressed as follows:—

Mrs. Jane Q. Smith

General Delivery

Washington DC 20090-9999

In the ZIP+4 code, the add-on code for general delivery is 9999. The main post office in a community will hold such mail for up to 30 days. This may be a different post office from where oversized packages and registered mail are held for any particular zip code. Note that many post offices within a medium to large city do not have general delivery, and mail addressed to these zip codes will either be forwarded to the Main Post Office or returned to sender.