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The Race against Waste: Some horses funked the fences
 national |
environment |
opinion/analysis
 Tuesday April 05, 2005 18:37 by John Fitz
Phonebooks & Golden Pages weigh 5,000 tons cost €20 million
We paid 20 million Euro for 3.4 million Golden Pages and Phonebook issued last year. To avoid waste & paying again this yeart- ACT NOW!- details below If you don't need the Golden Pages and, or Phonebook instruct (email or letter for record) your service provider e.g. Eircom or O2 or etc and Golden Pages (who distribute both) not to deliver it (or them). Use old directories, 11811- directory enquiries, or www.eircom.net etc to easily get numbers. Ask for a rebate of the saved production cost- €6 per book not taken.
Act now to avoid a print overrun & and having to pay again this year for unwanted issues. The case is made
After 6 months of phone calls and emails last year, Golden Pages arranged for the directories (supplied contrary to my instruction to Eircom & them not to do so) to be collected from me in January ’05.
A simple email (or letter) as below is adequate. If your service provider is O2, Smart or other than Eircom put that address in also
- - - - - - - - - - -
To: info@goldenpages.ie, ccm@eircom.ie, consumerline@comreg.ie
CC:
Sent:
Subject: Unwanted Directories (insert Your Phone no. here, your account no here).
To: The Manager Golden Pages, The Manager Eircom Customer Care, The Director Comreg
A Chairde,
To minimise waste, please do not send me the Phonebook or Golden Pages any more. Please confirm that my instructions are logged and will be complied with. Please arrange to credit my account €12 production cost.
Regards,
Signed:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
If phoning note the operators name & time and date of call. Ask for confirmation that your instruction has been logged and will be complied with Eircom Freephone 1800 400 000 Golden Pages Distribution: Freephone 1800 20 20 20
For those who are not customers of Eircom the freephone numbers for other service providers are at the bottom of the first page of the Phone Book (Telephone directory)
- - - - - - - -- - -
Inform your employer, friends, etc also so they can minimise requirements. Tell them that Golden Pages are making special arrangements to put directories on company networks. Apparently the Gardai take 10,000 copies and UCD a similar amount. Use your, and you colleagues influence to full effect.
We all get a bonus for this kind of action- a better environment and cheaper phone service.
If you feel enthusiastic about this go a bit further- email, phone or write to Comreg & the Secretary of the Dept of the Environment as follows
To:The Director, Comreg, consumerline@comreg.ie
The Secretary General, secretary-general@environ.ie
Subject: Unwanted Phone Directories are Junk mail Why should we pay
Dear Director and Secretary General
Please arrange that-
1. the Irish regulation that requires a phonebook to be given to all households is amended to “households that want it only”. Likewise, the Golden Pages. This is to comply with Government and EU policy of minimising waste.
2. telephone service providers be directed to notify all their customers that directories would be provided only to those that return a request form in a pre addressed envelope supplied.
3. a rebate of €6 (production cost) per directory be given to customers not taking directories
4. all be informed of the options for getting required numbers, 11811 internet etc
5. a “new numbers” addendum, for a number of years, be offered to those needing paper directories and
6. a CD (at cost) to those with PCs but not on the internet and
that this be expedited to minimise waste this year
Thank you for your cooperation in this matter
Yours truly,
Signed:-
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Comments (7 of 7)
Jump To Comment: 7 6 5 4 3 2 1Minimising Waste
Quote Lara Hill Fri Sep 16, 2005 15:34 0861717726
"a couple of months ago I copied your e-mail template and sent it to all the addresses you suggested. I got an encouraging response from all the agencies either by e-mail or phone acknowledging my request. Despite this, the Golden Pages and the Eircom phonebook were delivered to my flat".
Never too late to follow up Lara. Remind them by just replying to their replies and insisting on action. They must collect them. Ask for a refund the 12 Euro it cost to produce them. CC the minister for the environment- minister@environ.ie
by Lara Hill Fri Sep 16, 2005 15:34 0861717726
Another little action I did a few months ago has been more successful. I made a small notice 'NO JUNKMAIL, NO TAKEAWAY MENUS, NO BROCHURES, NO LEAFLETS/FLIERS' in red and black letters on white card. I put it in a little clear plastic bag to waterproof it and stuck it beside my letterbox; it's worked! Since then I've received less than 5 fliers.
Now that's an good idea. Imitatiion is the best form of flattery so I'm cogging your idea.
There's another junk problem- An Post is now accepting junk mail. NTL is a key offender. I've returned many mailshots to them marked JUNK MAIL but they continue to send. I now have 11 items from NTL which I'm returning to An Post with instructions not to accept further licenced mail from NTL for my address. More later
I really liked your idea of stopping the delivery of phone directories to minimise waste. So a couple of months ago I copied your e-mail template and sent it to all the addresses you suggested. I got an encouraging response from all the agencies either by e-mail or phone acknowledging my request. Despite this, the Golden Pages and the Eircom phonebook were delivered to my flat. I was really angry and frustrated. I guess I should have followed it up with the agencies, but I just gave up and recycled the old books.
Another little action I did a few months ago has been more successful. I made a small notice 'NO JUNKMAIL, NO TAKEAWAY MENUS, NO BROCHURES, NO LEAFLETS/FLIERS' in red and black letters on white card. I put it in a little clear plastic bag to waterproof it and stuck it beside my letterbox; it's worked! Since then I've received less than 5 fliers. I rang up one company (a car valeting service) to complain that they had ignored my request. I also took the opportunity to share my anti-car culture views. He told me to fuck off and hung up. I wouldn't mind but twice on his unsolicited flier he highlighted how proffesional his service was. Anyway this was one small set back in an otherwise successful action and I'd recommend it to anyone trying to reduce paper waste
Postscript
If you want the The Independent Directory, collected,ring 01 4112000 or email info@indocom.ie,
This waste reduction will reduce GNP a little but there's scope for much more. Think about it!
Maybe growth isn't all it's cracked up to be.
What these actions do is to stop people making money out of waste production so others can make money out of waste disposal & then we can all be overjoyed by the growth in the economy. Yes we need to consider the implications
Think of it as a small contribution to ensure lucrative advertising revenues for me and my ilk .... surely you can afford the sacrifice .....
It's amazing that UCD might recieve ten thousand phone books a year. That's probably one for every office, all of which would have computers on UCDs local area network. We might think that they'd just make a digital phone book available on their LAN, reduce the number of phone books to a couple of hundred and save fifty something thousand a year.
It lacks imagination that no one has thought of this before when the entire university is being restructured to save money.
I agree but If people dont use them then they're ineffective- just a hunk of junk. Why should we pay 12 Euro for that?
I support the general idea of reducing the amount of phonebooks printed each year. However, one reason why Eircom/O2/The Golden Pages might be against a reduction is that a decrease in the circulation of the phonebooks might lead to a decrease in their advertising revenue.