order collectors. Promotional postal orders Some companies have issued promotional postal orders (PPO) with the permission of Royal Mail as part of their promotions. Such companies include Reader's Digest and Cinzano. These postal orders are classified in a sub-group of their own. They were all issued throughout Great Britain, with one notable exception, the Fife Council PPOs, only issued in Fife, Scotland, which were used to pay for shopping at the stores that were part of the scheme. The Fife Council PPOs were introduced in 1996 and were discontinued on 31 March 2001. In late 2002, the Royal Mail decided to introduce a series of gift postal orders. These have been retained. Since then, Royal Mail introduced a series of postal orders which can be used for purchases at Argos stores. These have since been withdrawn. Postal orders in literature The 1946 play The Winslow Boy by Terence Rattigan, and the two subsequent films based on it, features the story of a schoolboy trying to clear his name over the theft of a five-shilling postal order. The story was loosely based on the real-life George Archer-Shee case. Postal orders were also referenced by W. H. Auden in the opening words of Night Mail (1936). Resurgence and revamp Postal orders are now becoming increasingly popular as a form of payment, thanks to the auction websites such as eBay, and it is much safer for the seller than paying by cheque, as postal orders cannot bounce. The vendor does not have to wait for clearance, which happens with cheques. In April 2006, the postal order system underwent a revamp, enabling individual post offices to print postal orders on demand in any value from 50p through to 250 pounds, instead of the previous 50p to 20 pounds fixed range. As a result, single postal orders can now be purchased for odd denominations such as 66p or 99p, rather than having to make up odd amounts through a combination of pre-printed denominations and affixed stamps. This has made British postal orders similar to the money orders issued by post offices in the United States and many other countries. See also British Field Post Office postal orders Postal Order Society Postal orders of Ireland Postal orders of New Zealand Postal orders of Nigeria Promotional postal order External links Royal Mail Malta Post Currencies of England Currencies of Scotland Currencies of the United Kingdom United Kingdom