Page 4 - Prepaid Reply Cards

1. STRUCTURE OF A DOUBLE CARD WITH ATTACHED REPLY PART

VARIATIONS OF THE «DOUBLE CARD» FORMAT
The UPU never gave standard advice on the physical design of a double card consisting of a question card with
an adjacent reply card. Until around the 1890s several different «designs» were issued due to the many variations
possible.
Ultimately, the most practical design became the design whereby the reply card is folded behind the question card
along the long, top edge. By this, the face of the reply card and therefore the incipium is not visible while the card
is folded and therefore secured against unintended cancellations and markings.
All other designs soon proved to be impractical either because the fact that both the pre-franked question face
and the reply face of the double faced the outside led to undesired premature cancellations of the return franking,
or the fold at the short edge and resulting lever effect on the long edges of the cards resulted in unwanted tears
and a loss of the reply card.

Folding layout
proofed most
practical

Q
R

Type 1

Other folding
layouts that
proofed to be
impractical

R

Type 2

Q

R

Type 3

Q R

Type 4

Q: Question part
R: Reply part

Specimen of the 1883 Costa Rica double card. The card is designed according to the unfavourable «Type 3»
layout. The card is an nice example of early uncertainties and shows several other flaws: The card is missing
the required inscription in French language, the question part does not show the inscription «Postcard with
paid reply» and the reply part show the summarized costs of the cards of 4 centavos (2+2 centavos) while the
question part show no value.

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