Up until this DXPedition, I’d only received on IRC (International Reply Coupon) and simply passed it on to another JA who’s confirmation I wanted. With the flood of E51AMF QSL cards, I received a pile of IRCs and needed a mechanism to redeem them. Coincidentally, Dan – W7WA, posted to the Western Washington DX Club’s Yahoo Group (“reflector”) that he’d been successful doing so, last week. He shared the magic incantation:
On their touch screen ask the clerk to proceed as follows:
Sales => More => Exchanges => Foreign IRC
I visited our tiny little post-office and muttered the magic words. Indeed, they are redeemable for stamps or stamped envelopes at the rate of $1.15/IRC. The postmaster, who was curious enough to come out of his office to observe the transaction, said that they will likely track the value of one Global Forever stamp (currently $1.15). The magic phrase (“Sales, More, Exchanges, Foreign IRC”) was exactly what they needed. It turned a blank stare into “no problem!” 3 minutes had I left with 12 moon-themed global forever stamps (plus the 200 I bought!)