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QSL Basics
If you are working toward any of the awards that are
available to hams you will have to get into QSL'ing. This is simply sending and
receiving a QSL card as written proof that the contact took place. While it
sounds simple at first glance, it doesn't always work out that way.
Although this web site is oriented more toward the beginning to intermediate
DX'er in the US, there are also awards that require domestic QSL's. Two of the
most popular domestic awards are Worked All States, or WAS, and the County
Hunters award. For these awards you will need to get QSL cards from stateside
stations, and that isn't always easy. You should always send an SASE along with
your card.
Even if you do that, in my experience the return rate is often very low. The
reason may be that the other station just does not QSL. A lot of stateside hams
seem not to return QSL's to stateside operators. It may be that your mail got
lost, it does happen but not that often. Or it may be that the other station
meant to do it whenever they got around to it, and in the meantime your QSL and
envelope got discarded. So, for stateside QSL's just plan on a lot of no
returns.
If you are trying to get a QSL for a DX station that has a stateside manager
it's a whole different story. I don't think I have ever not received a QSL back
from a stateside manager. Sometimes it takes a little while, for several
reasons. If the station you worked was a DX'pedition it is very likely that the
cards will not even be ordered until after the operation is over and everyone
involved is back home. This can add several weeks, maybe longer, to the waiting
period. Then the logs have to be transferred to the manager which may take any
where from a matter of days to possibly weeks, just depends. If there are a lot
of contacts, and a lot of QSL cards pouring in, it just takes time to check each
contact off and get the cards out. Think about it, how many QSL cards could you
fill out in a day and take to the post office? What if you have a job and a
family? What if there are 60,000 or more QSO's? I think you are beginning to get
the idea.
Another different situation is where the DX station was actually a stateside
ham that went on vacation to a DX country and operated while there. A lot of the
time these operators will not have a manager and most of the time they will
answer QSL request, but once in a while I have sent a card and never received
one. Usually these are for countries where a lot of people operate from and
sooner or later you will get a card to confirm it.
Some stations in some of the harder countries to work will ask for you to QSL
direct, but you never get a card in return. There are many possibilities, but
one big one is that the mail is being intercepted before it gets to the ham. In
some areas of the world the couple bucks that you stick in an envelope is a lot
of money and a lot of people are very bad off. If they know that a certain
person received money in the mail they may take it out of need, or just greed.
It happens. All you can do is try to find an alternate way to exchange cards.
Sending a second card direct may be OK, just in case the first one was actually
lost. After that I don't think there is any need to send another card because
there is probably someone taking the money and trashing the card.