If the customer's letter is of such a nature as tb require a special answer, or if it asks for information of a specialist order, the letter is passed on for reply to the correspondence clerk whom the " clearer" knows to be best fitted to deal with it. The " clearing-house" is thus the pivot of the business. It is here that; the brain of the staff is centralised.
The further duties of the " clearer" are to check the entries in the bookkeeping department and to make arrangements for the execution of the customer's order with the minimum of delay. If for any special reason there will necessarily be time lost in satisfactorily carrying out the order, he Neill see that a letter is immediate despatched to the customer acqiniinting him with the cause of delay and stating when he expect arrival of goods. It must always be borne in mind that in trusting a strange firm with cash a man will always experience a certain amount of anxiety from the moment his letter is swallowed up by the pillar-box. Ile has not that guarantee of integrity that conies from a personal view of the business and the men who are supplying his needs. This is a point in human nature that must be allowed for.
The proper reply having been decided on by the " clearer," and the letter passed into the hands of the proper correspondence clerk, the order is simultaneously extracted for the stock-room, where the parcel is made up. The correspondence clerk makes out the letter and the typed label and the two are sent together to the despatch-room for inclusion in and adhesion to the parcel. In the bookkeeping department the cash received or the -credit allowed is entered up in a card-index. With the large number of customers and the relative smallness and infrequency of orders pertaining to a mail order business, the ordinary ledger systems would be found cumbersclme and slow to work.
The above, though perhaps entering into details which would not be applicable to all mail-order businesses, gives an account of a machine system which would deal to a large extent mechanically and automatically •Nith the ordinary routine work, and should form a substantial foundation for the particular system to be built up according to the needs of an individual firm.
mentioned above, a large varietrof are necessary. These must vary so with the particular nature of the mail-order business that it would hardly serve a useful purpose to quote definite examples. The composition of the letters needs all the knowledge of human nature and all the skill of the organiser of the business. They should he buttered with brains. They should grip in the opening paragraph. They should express the finest shades of persuasiveness, forcefulness, and downright earnestness. A collection of such letters should form a delicate and responsive organ on which the " clearer" can play with absolute confidence, that the finest shades of feeling in his mind will receive clear-toned and harmonious expression.
The printing and typing of these letters requires careful attention. They are of course printed from type through ribbon to imitate typewriting with the greatest possible naturalness, and the name and address of the customer are inserted by a typist. It is essential that printing and taping ,s•hould exactly match. A customer who receives what is on the face of it a stock letter with his name and address carelessly inserted, will certainly resen' it, or at best treat it with indifference. Such letters feed waste-paper baskets. In order to secure uniformity of lettering, the typist should be directed to take the greatest care in matching the typewriting with the imitation lettering, seeing, for instance, that the spacing of the name and address tallies in general form with the spacing of the rest of the letter. But it is highly advisable that the letters sent out by the typist be overlooked before they are mailed off, even if no personal signature on the part of a partner in the firm be required. In no case should postscripts be tacked on to letters. No customer feels flattered at receiving a two-page letter on general talk ending with a postscript answering the question he put in his letter. It reads too like an afterthought. The answer to his question should be assigned the prominent place in the letter—at the beginning. This is the human nature touch once again.