Advertising mail is almost completely self-regulated by the junk mail industry. There are two exceptions, but only one of them is positive for junk mail haters. The positive exception is the GDPR, which gives you the right to demand an advertiser stops processing your personal data for "direct marketing" purposes. The not so positive exception is that electoral registration offices are by law required to sell copies of the so-called open electoral register to any person or organisation, at a subsided price and on a "no questions asked" basis.

I will cover both the "right to object" and the peddling of voters' personal details in much more detail later. For now, the main thing to note is that the GDRP is only useful if you want to force an individual junk mailer to stop pestering you. It is great to have that option but it is not an easy and effective way of stamping out all personally addressed junk mail. To prevent such junk mail you rely on the junk mail's industry's self-regulatory framework.

Checks and balances

You probably noticed I am not a fan of "self-regulation". To me, "self-regulation" is jargon for "letting the fox guard the henhouse". In our story, the fox is the DMA and you are obviously in the henhouse. The DMA aims to ward off legislation that would curtail unsolicited marketing — they do so by lobbying politicians and commissioning junk research that invariably shows that "consumers" love unsolicited marketing and that the UK economy would collapse if the freedom of marketers would be curtailed.

To be fair, self-regulation is a balancing act. Governments can intervene if self-regulation fails. In the UK, that happened in 2017, after the aggressive marketing tactics deployed by the charity fundraising industry had been exposed. The Government ordered a review of the industry and imposed a new self-regulatory framework, with a new regulator and a new opt-out scheme for charity marketing (the Fundraising Preference Service).

Such government intervention is very much the exception to the rule. We live in the age of neo-liberalism and governments of all colours have been reluctant to do anything that might upset the junk mail industry. This is most notable when it comes to the sale of voters' personal details. Since 2000, there have been two official reviews that recommended ceasing the sale of voters' personal details (the Working Party on Electoral Procedures Report and Data Sharing Review). In both cases, government decided to continue the use of the electoral register as commodity. I suspect that is partly because the media is largely uninterested in the issue. The charity fundraising industry was overhauled because of a continuous stream of exposés in newspapers such as the Daily Mail and Sun. There was no way the government could ignore all the stories about elderly people being hounded by charity marketers. The sale of the electoral register is a far less juicy topic and governments can therefore get away with quietly ignoring recommendations in official reviews.

It is also worth noting that there are different types of self-regulation — an industry doesn't always get free rein. This was the case between 2003 and 2012, when the junk mail industry had a so-called voluntary producer responsibility agreement with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra). This gave government some leverage over the industry; the DMA and its friends had to meet specific environmental targets. There was nothing in the agreement about what would happen if the industry failed to meet the targets but there was the possibility of government intervention should targets be missed. That said, as part of this agreement the DMA launched the Your Choice Dummy Scheme, which to this day holds the record of being the worst opt-out service on the planet.

Interestingly, the DMA launched Your Choice at a time when the government was making noises about an opt-in regime for junk mail. It appears the DMA was unconcerned about government intervention. Defra did at times try to use its leverage but it when things came to a head they backed down. This is also why the voluntary agreement ended in tears. In 2011, Defra wanted the industry to set up a single opt-out scheme for unaddressed mail along the lines of the Mailing Preference Service (the ill-fated Door-Drop Preference Service). The DMA simply refused to launch the opt-out scheme, and with that it also killed off the voluntary agreement — it was quietly dropped some time in 2012.

Opt-outs galore

The result of self-regulation is that we have a plethora of opt-out services. You are probably already familiar with the Mailing Preference Service (MPS), which is the the DMA's opt-out scheme for unsolicited addressed advertising mail. The scheme is somewhat limited, mainly because only members of the DMA are required to check if you are opted out. The MPS does very little to for instance stop unsolicited charity appeals, as few charities are DMA members. This is why the above-mentioned Fundraising Preference Service had to be created when charity marketing got out of hand; the MPS simply can't stop such mailings.

To prevent unsolicited addressed junk mail you can also try to prevent your personal details are added to junk mail databases. As I have already mentioned, the electoral register has historically been used as a junk mail database; list brokers such as Experian use the electoral roll to compile humongous "consumer databases" which are sold to other list brokers and junk mailers. If you just want to register to vote, and not have your personal details sold to junk mail companies in the process, then you need to opt out of being included on the open electoral register. It is also worth asking list brokers to not process your personal details for "marketing purposes".

The majority of junk mail is unaddressed, and there are two opt-out services for unaddressed mail: the Door-to-Door Opt-Out should stop unaddressed mail delivered by Royal Mail and the Your Choice Dummy Scheme is supposed to prevent unaddressed mail distributed by DMA members. The two schemes cover roughly half of all unaddress mail — the remaining half is unregulated. You can deter unregulated junk mail distributors with a 'no junk mail' sign but your mileage will vary.

Clearly, preventing unsolicited mail is a hassle. This is by design — it is a direct result of self-regulation. The junk mail industry could make opting out easy; there is no reason there can't be a single service that allows you to opt out of any type of unwanted mail. But, they much prefer the current plethora of half effective opt-out services. They can answer any critical questions by pointing to the opt-out schemes and continue business as usual. Of course, a critical journalist or MP could ask further questions about the effectiveness of the opt-out schemes. However, the reality is that, in all the years that I have been battling junk mail, not a single journalist or MP has asked any such questions, ever.

How change happens

Over the years I have had hundreds of emails from people wanting to share stories and make campaign suggestions. By far the most common suggestion I get is to encourage people to send all unwanted mail back to the sender. I always saw this as a "last resort" measure and instead advised people to use all the opt-outs available and to then return any junk mail that slips through the net. I have changed my mind on this. I now think routinely sending back all unwanted junk mail is the most effective solution.

The reason is that self-regulation has failed. Jumping through all the junk mail industry's hoops will somewhat reduce junk mail but it won't do anything to fix the broken self-regulatory framework. If enough junk mail haters routinely return junk mail to the sender/offender the industry would have to act, as it would be huge burden. Giving junk mail haters an easy and effective way to opt out would quickly become a very attractive proposition.

If you feel returning junk mail is too radical, one of the first people to endorse the practice was none other than former Prime Minister and Postmaster General Clement Attlee. When the Post Office started delivering door-to-door items in 1964, Attlee told the House of Lords that he would be sending the leaflets straight back, addressed to the Postmaster General. Nowadays, you can simply use Freepost Royal Mail Customer Services (that is the full address).