The Vectis postal service was a postal service set up during the national postal strike of the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

in 1971. This was amongst a number of local delivery services which flourished during the strike. The service was set up by a group of Ryde business men, led by R. W. Cawdell, C.C., who acted as head postmaster for the service. It covered an area encompassing the whole of the

Isle of Wight The Isle of Wight ( ) is a Counties of England, county in the English Channel, off the coast of Hampshire, from which it is separated by the Solent. It is the List of islands of England#Largest islands, largest and List of islands of England#Mo ...

. At peak the service handled over 1500 items of mail daily. The national postal strike ended on 8 March 1971, and with it the local service.

Stamps

An initial set of stamps with a face value of 5p or 1/- in white and blue were issued

imperforate For postage stamps, separation is the means by which individual stamps are made easily detachable from each other. Methods of separation include: # perforation: cutting rows and columns of small holes # rouletting: small horizontal and vert ...

on 22 January and sheets of 48 on 23 January. A First Day Cover was also issued on the same day. A further printing in green was issued on 16 February 1971. During the time the service was in operation

decimal currency Decimalisation or decimalization (see spelling differences) is the conversion of a system of currency or of weights and measures to units related by powers of 10. Most countries have decimalised their currencies, converting them from non-decimal ...

was introduced across the UK on 15 February.

References

{{Reflist History of the Isle of Wight Postal history of the United Kingdom 1971 in England