Matt Thompson, 40, became fed up after regularly missing letters and parcels which were mistakenly delivered to seven neighboring houses with the same postcode in Ulceby, Lincolnshire.
“We live in a remote rural area and there are seven other properties in a mile radius with the same postcode,“ the single farmer said. “I rarely get my letters and mail delivered to me on the first occasion because posties and delivery drivers can’t distinguish my home from the others.”
Matt said that he had been waiting for some post to arrive and the delivery drivers asked him if his property had any distinguishing features. After growing annoyed that his posts were delivered to other people in the area, he decided to come up with an ingenious solution.
In order to make his home more visible, he bought two decommissioned Tornado fighter jet fuel tanks for 600 pounds (approx. US$790) and displayed them outside his front door.
Matt found the fuel tanks in an army surplus yard in Staffordshire and thought they would fit perfectly.
“The aluminum tanks weighed around 600kg and they were transported from Stoke-On-Trent to the farm,” he said. “The driver from the transport company said he got a few funny looks on the way up.”
However, what was even more humorous was that he couldn’t find the property when he got there.
“Like everyone else, he was trying to find us using his satnav, which proved slightly problematic,“ he said. ”The problem is because we live in such a spare area, when you put our postcode in on the satnav, it may show one house, or another a mile away.”
He now encourages people and companies to reference the 1.2-ton military hardware on envelopes to help postmen deliver to the right address.
Since having the fuel tanks displayed outside his home, the single farmer has never had a letter or parcel go astray.
“They certainly stand out, and that was my intention. The plan has worked,” Matt said. “Some people call their house a different name or put gnomes in the garden, I put a fighter jet in mine.”
Needless to say, the two tanks are now a prominent landmark and a lot of people now stop and look.
“When you tell people where you live, they say: ‘Is that place with the fuel tanks?’ They have become a bit of a local celebrity,” he concluded.
