There was a great Seinfeld episode (Season 9 – Episode 5) where Kramer tries to cancel his mail, forever. Here’s a clip certain to bring a smile to your face: (click here or below)
I have just gone through a similar experience. Our friends often ask us how we will get our mail once we set sail. My answer is usually, “I don’t want the mail”. I don’t remember when the last time anything pleasant arrived in the mail. No one writes letters anymore. Cards are a declining industry. Certified stuff is usually always really bad news and almost all the mail we receive is junk mail. I refer to getting the mail as “cleaning out the mailbox”.
Any accounts or companies with which we do business offering the option to go paperless are now converted to that setting. Our bank offers deposits made by scanning checks or submitting a picture of the check. For the most part, just about anything financial can be done online. We can pay all of our bills online. We just need to ensure we have a secure internet connection when accessing our stuff. For our foreign currency needs, we will use local area ATMs. For most purchases, we will use a credit card. Our bank does not charge the fees other banks charge for transactions outside of the USA. These can sometime run as high as 3%.
So, for the most part, we can fire the postal service. But, and you knew there had to be a “but” coming, the Federal Government requires all citizens and residents to establish residency in at least one state. Hmm! And, what about those odd times when we need to get something by mail like the dreaded audit letter from the IRS? Since we must pick a state in which to reside then, it makes perfect sense to pick one with no state income tax. This narrows our choices to seven: Alaska, Florida, Nevada, South Dakota, Texas, Washington and Wyoming .This is where St. Bendan’s Isle is pure genius.
St. Bendan’s Isle is a company serving the needs of RVer’s, cruisers, traveling nurses, business execs and merchant marines. They allow us to establish a presence in the USA, Florida to be specific. It is also an electronic mail forwarding company. Here is how it works. When we receive a letter (remember what those are?), they will scan the front of it. When we access our account online, we can view the pdf scan and: a) shred it. b) have them open it and scan the contents. c) forward it to us at an address we specify, such as a marina where we may be currently docked. They will also receive boat parts for us and send them to us wherever we are located. Even better, they can get us discounts on boat parts. My kind of place! They do all this for a small fee of $14 per month. Pretty darn cool, huh!
We are pleased to announce, we have officially become Floridians.
Please note the gray cloudy sky
