Swiss Post International

Beginning in the summer of 1996 Swiss Post International ("SPI"), the international arm of the Swiss postal service inaugurated a mail dispatch system in Italy geared to tourists and others desiring to send postcards or other parcels to destinations anywhere outside Italy. The service competed with the domestic Italian Post Office by offering faster and more reliable service at lower cost.

For tourist postcards, self-adhesive labels indicating prepayment with the inscription "P.P." (having similar characteristics to postage stamps but no stated denomination) were sold in booklets of 8 for 8,000 lire. SPI established over 100 collection points in 10 cities in Italy where the booklets were sold and where postcards could be dropped off. SPI representatives made daily pickups and the postcards were privately couriered to Switzerland where they were entered into the normal mail stream, however, without the benefit of cancellations.

This example illustrates the use of these private (as far as the Italians were concerned) labels.