In 1858, Joseph Sloper of London was granted Letters Patent for the process of perforating holes in the pattern of letters or insignia, and for the perforating apparatus to produce them, as a means of marking cheques and other documents so that they could not be altered, or otherwise fraudulently dealt with.

Adhesive postage stamps had been introduced in 1840, and Post Office regulations allowed for them to be redeemed at Post Offices or used to make payments. These negotiable items no doubt were temptations to many of the junior clerks and office boys, whose job it probably was to handle a firm’s stamps and deliver mail to the Post Office. Instances of such petty theft led to court cases, one of which involved a young office boy who soaked the stamps off the firm’s mail which he was delivering to the Post Office, and then cashed in the stamps! This led to Joseph Sloper applying to the Post Office to be allowed to use his perforating process on stamps as a means of identifying the firms who owned the stamps. After lengthy correspondence, he was granted approval to do so in 1868, with the Post Office amending their regulations so that stamps so perforated could not be redeemed.

English mail with perforated stamps (“perfins”) went to many countries in Europe and around the world, and the concept of the perforated stamps soon caught on. Their use in other countries spread rapidly, especially when Joseph Sloper’s patent, and monopoly, expired in 1872.

In the Australian colonies and in New Zealand at that time, most of the firms traded extensively with British manufacturers and would have also seen perfins, and those using large volumes of mail such as warehousemen soon copied the idea. The earliest known approval to use perfins by an Australian firm was granted on 27 September 1877 by the postal department in Adelaide, South Australia, to the firm of D. & J. Fowler Ltd., wholesale grocers. A two-die perforator was manufactured for this firm by Joseph Sloper in February 1880 and a sample strike from this machine (Sloper serial number 5457) is in the earliest Sloper Workshop Impression Book.  The earliest dated Australian stamp with perfin is from early 1880.

The pilfering of telegrams with stamps affixed to pay the fee led to the firm of Thomas Brown & Sons of Brisbane applying to the Deputy Postmaster-General in Brisbane for permission to perforate stamps to be used on telegrams and letters.

The practice of using perforated stamps in Australia took the postal authorities somewhat by surprise, and it was not until 1883 that the first regulations relating to them appeared (in Victoria) and then much later in other States. For example, on 16 April 1894, in response to the Perth firm of Courthope Drummond & Co. applying to perforate stamps, the West Australian Postmaster-General sent the following message by Electric Telegraph to the Secretary, General Post Office, Brisbane:

“Is it allowed your colony merchants & business firms to perforate postage stamps purchased by them with their initials as is done in England. If not do you know of any objection to the practice being allowed.”

Initially, only the largest firms could justify the cost of a perforating machine, but the financial crash of the 1890s made the problem of petty pilfering more acute and more firms looked to this practice.  Most of the early perforating machines used in Australia were made in England by Sloper and others. However, one person who saw a business opportunity associated with this practice was Edward Thomas Moulden of Melbourne.  He was a stamp vendor in the early 1890s, and he offered a perforating service to firms both large and small. Between 1893 and 1895, Moulden applied many times to the Victorian postal department to perforate stamps on behalf of his customers. He used a grid of holes into which pins could be placed to create the patterns of initials desired, so it could easily be changed for each batch of stamps. This meant that no exacting engineering was needed, and customers did not have to outlay the relatively large cost of a customized perforating machine. Moulden’s perfin patterns are easily identified by the rough nature of the pin holes, variations in the size, shape and spacing of the letters, and frequently missing pins. He probably also made separate machines for some large firms using the same grid system, as some of these patterns are known used over an extensive period of time and long after Moulden’s death. It is believed that there may have been others who copied Moulden’s idea, both in Melbourne and in Sydney. The Melbourne firm of C.G. Roeszler & Sons are known to have made several customized perforating machines.

Customised perforating machines ranged from single-die devices, usually operated by a lever action, up to some very large devices for firms with very large volumes of mail.  For example, one device made by Joseph Sloper & Co of London for the Sydney firm of Anthony Hordern & Sons had 5 rows with 10 dies in each row!  The device measured 26 inches by 7 inches (66 cm by 17.5 cm), and was operated by a screw mechanism similar to a book press.

Various governments around Australia also used perfins. The early Colonial  Governments used such patterns as “OS/NSW”, “SA”, “T”, “VG” and “WA”, and later the Federal Government departments used “OS”.  The last usage of perfins by commercial firms was in 1976, although the NSW and Victorian State Governments still used “G/NSW” and “VG” respectively until 1989. Use of franking machines, “postage paid” envelopes and bulk postage eventually led to the demise of perfins.

There are nearly 3,000 known Australian perfin patterns, if one counts all the ones produced by Edward Moulden in the batches for his customers (one of his frequent customers has over 50 known patterns).  New Zealand, with its smaller population and fewer large companies, has 45 known patterns, all of which are from customized perforators.

Perfins present something of a conundrum for the exhibitor. As seen from the front of a stamp, a perfin pattern may be hard to discern among the stamp’s design. On the other hand, some judges in philatelic exhibitions have expressed adverse comments about stamps being mounted face down.

Perfins reflect a lot about our history. Although the original purpose of perfins was to minimize the risk of theft of stamps, no doubt some companies saw it as a chance to “advertise” their company name on stamps as the initials are usually visible from the front of the stamps when they are affixed to envelopes. The use of perfins in Australia quickly accelerated in the early 1890s, especially in the economic crash of that period in Victoria, and this was aided by Edward Thomas Moulden as described above. Perfin use started to decline after World War I, partly with the “retirement” of Moulden and partly due to forms of indicating pre-paid postage other than traditional adhesive stamps.

The Perfin Club of New Zealand and Australia was formed in 1987 to enable perfin collectors to share information about perfins, and to exchange perfin material. The Club has produced two catalogues, one for Australian Official perfins and the other for Australian private perfins. In addition, one of the members has produced a monograph with a detailed treatment of the “VG perfins used b y the Government of Victoria.  The Club’s web page can be found at Perfin Club of New Zealand and Australia or by a Google search for “Perfin Club of New Zealand and Australia”.