"DEAR postman, please deliver this card to Miss Thompson in time for Christmas, you should recognise her farm because there is a 4x4 parked in the driveway and there are usually geese, sheep and ducks wandering around.

I hope you can deliver it, but she might live in Ireland, I'm not too sure."

It might seem like an impossible task, but hard-pressed Royal Mail staff in York were not fazed when they received an envelope with that address this week.

A selection of incorrectly, and sometimes amusingly, addressed letters pass through the city's two sorting offices every day. Some have no address whatsoever.

But far from throwing the letters into a box to be forgotten about, postal workers often turn detective, using local knowledge, to get the letters to their rightful destination. Glyn Owen, delivery office manager at Birch Park, York, said: "Often people forget to write the address, sometimes they just put the person's name, and quite often people put the wrong postcode on, like YO32 instead of YO23, which sends it to the wrong office.

"We had one the other day that just said to the bungalow with the green door on the corner of two streets, and it had the person's surname. Unfortunately, one of the streets named was in York, but the other one wasn't."

Mr Owen said any details included in the address, such as a house name, can be run through his computer, and sometimes they come up with a correct match.

If all else fails the mail will be sent to the National Return Centre in Belfast, where staff are authorised to open the mail in the hopes of finding a return address.

Royal Mail spokeswoman Wendy Martin said: "Our staff do take the time and trouble to find the recipient. Sometimes they have to turn detective in order to do that. The most important message for all our customers is to take that little bit of extra care because we want to get your letters and cards there safely in time for Christmas."

:: Get on the write track

FOLLOW these simple rules to ensure your mail is delivered:

Ideally include the full address - house number/name, road name, town, county and the correct postcode

If you do not know the postcode DO NOT GUESS. Contact your local mail sorting office and staff will be able to look up correct postcodes for you Alternatively visit www.royalmail.com or phone postcode enquiries on 0906 3021222 (calls cost 50p per minute)

Make sure each piece of mail has got a stamp, to the correct value

Write a return name and address on the back of the envelope so any undelivered mail can be returned.

:: Postal posers

A parcel of photos with no name or address was delivered in Martlesham Heath, Suffolk, after a postman recognised someone in one picture

Royal Mail staff tracked down the rightful recipients of a card from Canada, addressed only to: "Mr and Mrs Abercrombie, Ilkley-Moor-By-Tat, Yorkshire, England"

The Abercrombies actually lived in Burley-in-Wharfedale, near Ilkley

Postman Nigel Harper was able to deliver a card addressed simply to: "Helen and Dave, with a dog called Bodger, Featherstone"

Louis Hopkins, 69, received a letter addressed only to: "The house at the end of the long road which runs parallel to the railway lines and ends at the gasometer".

Updated: 09:26 Saturday, December 18, 2004