The government has created a new class of entrepreneurs. They are people who provide a service so that owners of prohibited items don't have to forfeit them to the Transportation Security Administration at the airport, according to a recent Wall Street Journal item.
One of these services is MailBack which sells envelopes and postage at various airport retailers so that pocket knife and scissor owners can mail those items back to themselves at the airport. If the traveler is thinking ahead then he/she can print out his/her own MailBack envelope -- go here and click on the PDF file. Although if he/she really is thinking ahead then one must wonder why he/she didn't just leave the offending item at home in the first place. But never mind.
Another innovative service is ReturnKey. It's an outfit in League City, Texas, that makes an ATM like machine they call an AMK for Automatic Mailing Kiosk -- see a photo here. They are located in just a handful of airports now, but there's bound to be a growing demand for them as they seem quite easy to use with a touch screen on the machines which provide an envelope and a slot in which to insert the envelope containing the knife, etc.
(Note: If the offending items is a handgun then I don't know what to tell you. None of these services mention handguns on their websites. You can forget about sending one through the U.S. Postal Service. And the commercial delivery services either prohibit them or make it very difficult. So the best bet is to check with the airline in advance for rules on packing them with non-carry on luggage.)
Since the TSA has been confiscating knives and scissors they've accumulated tons of the things -- personal treasures or illegal items, depending on your perspective. And, according to another Wall Street Journal article, much of that stuff ends up sold on E-bay. Do an E-bay search for the term "NTSA" and you'll see lists with knives, scissors and tools sold by the pound. As of just a few minutes ago there were 87 lots for sale there. And there could be some real treasures there -- some pocket knives can be quite valuable.
The entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well in America. They saw a need, and they started a business. Those folks keep the economy humming, and it's such a thrill to see it happening.
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