[Dx-qsl] Frustration

Wed Sep 6 07:59:56 EDT 2006

I fully understand your "pain". It also became more difficult when IOTA 
changed the rules and required the island name starting in 2000 rather 
than just an address and/or IOTA number. I have a few pre-2000 cards 
that qualified then but would not qualify now. I live on NA-026, not a 
rare one by any measure, but my QSL cards are all correctly labeled for 
IOTA credit.
I am currently at 347 IOTA's confirmed and have had two or three 
rejected due to insufficient information. They were domestic cards and 
the ops were gracious enough to send me amended cards. A notable 
incident happened back in 2001 with a Swan Island operation, NA-035. 
Apparently there was a problem with the cards they had sent out and at 
their own expense they resent new cards to everyone who QSL'd. I was 
very impressed.
As for the NA-052 (Marco Island), there is probably not much you can do 
to get a corrected card if the op will not respond. That island is on 
occasionally, especially the Marco Island club station K5MI, so you 
should be able to get it eventually. You could contact the RSGB IOTA 
committee and advise them of the situation with the W4 op. That would 
potentially prevent the op from claiming IOTA credit for having 
activated it and providing 50+ QSO's required. I think most of these 
problem QSL's are probably just due to the operator not being familiar 
with the IOTA program. Yes they enjoy the pileups but don't bother to 
see what is required to properly document it. It sounds like the W4 
card you received was a stock card for his home station and that he did 
not bother to have any special QSL's made up for his mini-dxpedition. 
Robert, N2JTX
KIR wrote:
> I'm an IOTA chaser. Too many times now I've been screwed by a few of 
> our fellow hams in getting qualifying QSL cards. Here's what I'm 
> talking about using the most recent example.
>> One year ago I worked a W4 who lives in North Port Florida. He was 
> operating from an island off the Florida coast (NA-052). He was openly 
> declaring on the air that he was on NA-052. Naturally, he was very 
> popular and there was always a considerable pile-up. After working him 
> I immediately sent him my card with a SASE. One year later I receive 
> his card in return. It was a quality W4MPY card properly filled out 
> but only showed his home address. It did not have the name of the 
> island nor an IOTA reference number printed on it. Therefore, this 
> card is useless to me in claiming credit for working NA-052. I sent 
> him an email pointing this out and asked for a corrected card but he 
> has not replied.
>> This same exact thing has happened to me several times in the past ... 
> they announce they are operating from an IOTA and enjoy the fun but 
> then do nothing to follow though after they get home. There are only 
> two possible reasons I can think of why they do this; either they are 
> unfamiliar with IOTA requirements or they know them but just don't 
> give a damn. I don't suppose there is anything we can do about this, 
> is there?
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