How to Stop Junk Mail and Opt Out

The short answer

To stop junk mail, opt out of prescreened credit card and insurance offers at OptOutPrescreen.com or 1-888-5-OPT-OUT (1-888-567-8688), which lasts five years, or permanently if you sign and mail the election form. Then register with DMAchoice ($8 online for 10 years) to cut catalogs and other mail from companies you don’t do business with, and ask each remaining sender to remove you. Neither list stops bills, political mail, “Current Resident” flyers, or mail from companies you already buy from.

Mail a letter online What happens to returned mail

What’s the fastest way to stop junk mail?

Junk mail reaches you through different lists, so no single sign-up stops all of it. Prescreened credit card and insurance offers come from lists the credit bureaus supply. Catalogs and other “prospect” mail come from companies you’ve never bought from. Customer and donor mail comes from companies and charities you already have a relationship with. And “Current Resident” flyers aren’t sent to a name at all. Each group has its own off switch.

Start with the two free-standing opt-outs, OptOutPrescreen.com and DMAchoice, then handle what’s left one sender at a time. The table shows each method, what it costs, and how long it lasts.

Ways to stop junk mail, with cost and duration (checked October 9, 2026)
Method	What it stops	Cost	How long it lasts
OptOutPrescreen.com or 1-888-5-OPT-OUT	Prescreened credit card and insurance offers based on Equifax, Experian, Innovis, and TransUnion lists	No fee listed by the FTC or CFPB	Five years online or by phone; permanent with the signed, mailed election form
DMAchoice (ANA)	Prospect mail such as catalogs, magazine offers, and donation requests from companies you don’t do business with	$8 online or $9 by mail	10 years
Contacting the sender	Catalogs and offers from companies you’ve bought from, subscribed to, or donated to	The cost of reaching the company	Set by each company
Asking an EDDM mailer to skip you	That business’s “Current Resident” or “Postal Customer” flyers	The cost of reaching the business	Set by the business
PS Form 1500 (Section 3010 list)	Unsolicited sexually oriented advertisements	No fee stated in DMM 508	5 years, then refile
Deceased Do Not Contact List (ANA)	Marketing mail addressed to someone who has died	$6	Permanent
Do Not Contact for Caretakers (ANA)	Marketing mail addressed to a person in your care	$7	Permanent

How do you stop credit card offers in the mail?

Most “preapproved” credit card and insurance offers are prescreened: a lender sets its criteria, and a credit bureau supplies the names of people whose credit reports meet them. The Fair Credit Reporting Act lets you take your name off those lists, and the FTC says the major credit bureaus run the opt-out website, OptOutPrescreen.com, and phone line, 1-888-5-OPT-OUT (1-888-567-8688).

You have two choices. An opt-out made online or by phone lasts five years. For a permanent opt-out, start the same way, then sign and return the Permanent Opt-Out Election form; under 15 U.S.C. § 1681b(e), an election made only through the phone or online system expires after five years. The site asks for your name, address, Social Security number, and date of birth. The FTC says the Social Security number and date of birth are optional but help the bureaus find your file.

Requests are processed within five days, but the FTC says it may take several weeks for the offers to stop, because some companies already have your name. Prescreening itself doesn’t hurt your credit score; the inquiries it leaves on your report don’t count against you. If you change your mind, you can opt back in through the same site or number.

It stops only offers built from the credit bureaus’ lists. The CFPB says card issuers can still write to you if you’ve done business with them before or get your name elsewhere.
Every prescreened offer must include a notice of your right to opt out with the toll-free number, under 15 U.S.C. § 1681m(d). Look for it on the offer itself.
Mail the signed permanent form yourself. It needs your handwritten signature, which a printed copy from a mailing service can’t supply.

How does DMAchoice work, and what does it cost?

DMAchoice is a mail preference service run by the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), a trade group, not the government or USPS. You register your name and address, and participating companies remove you from their prospect mailing lists. The USPS FAQ on refusing mail points people to it and notes that it’s independent of the Postal Service.

Registration costs $8 online or $9 by mail (a check or money order payable to the ANA, sent to DMAchoice, Consumer Preferences, P.O. Box 900, Cos Cob, CT 06807) and lasts 10 years. The FTC’s consumer pages still list older $6 and $7 fees; the ANA’s own registration page shows $8 and $9. One account can hold up to five name variations and five addresses, and the FTC says you can choose which catalogs, magazine offers, and other mail you still want.

The ANA estimates an 80% reduction in prospect mail and says to allow 90 days, because many mailings are prepared well in advance. It lists what DMAchoice won’t stop: bills, statements, and other transactional mail; prescreened credit offers; political mail; unaddressed “current resident” mail; small local retailers and restaurants; mail from companies you’ve bought from, subscribed to, or donated to in the past two years; and companies that don’t use the DMAchoice list.

How do you opt out of catalogs and mail from companies you already use?

Once you’ve bought from a company, subscribed, or donated, you’re a customer rather than a prospect, and DMAchoice can’t remove you. The FTC says the same about mail from local merchants, religious groups, charities, professional and alumni associations, and companies you already do business with: contact each source directly. The ANA suggests looking for contact details in the company’s privacy policy or Contact Us page, and says you can file a complaint with the ANA if a company ignores your removal request.

A short request works by phone, email, web form, or letter. A letter gives you a dated copy of exactly what you asked for. Here’s an example from a fictional customer:

Copy your name and address exactly as they appear on the mailing label, including any misspelling or customer number.
Say what to stop: “Please remove me from all catalog and promotional mailings and don’t rent, sell, or share my name and address.”
Example: “To Customer Service, Northfield Outdoor Co.: Please remove Dana Ruiz, 18 Birch Lane, Fairview, OH 44120, from your catalog and promotional mailing lists, and from any lists you share with other companies. Thank you.”
If several copies of the same catalog arrive under different spellings, list every version so the company can remove each one.
Leave out account passwords, card numbers, and your Social Security number; a removal request doesn’t need them.

DMAchoice FAQs: prospect vs. customer mail

Can you stop “Current Resident” and EDDM mail?

Not through an opt-out list. Flyers addressed to “Current Resident” or “Postal Customer” are often Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM), which a business sends to every address on the carrier routes it picks. There’s no name to match, so DMAchoice says its name-and-address opt-out won’t stop EDDM, and the FTC says to stop mail addressed to “occupant” or “resident,” you contact each source directly. USPS’s own FAQ on removing your name from mailing lists points to DMAchoice, which is independent of USPS, and to the credit bureaus’ opt-out line.

Contacting the sender does work for EDDM. USPS tells EDDM mailers that if a customer has asked to be removed, they should list that address in the “Do Not Deliver Address” column on the facing slip attached to each bundle. DMAchoice adds that you can ask your local Post Office whether it will honor a request, but it says a carrier would have to pull your piece from a prepared stack, so offices can’t easily do it.

Can you return junk mail to the sender?

Yes, if you haven’t opened it. The Domestic Mail Manual (DMM 508.1.1.3) lets you mark a piece “Refused” and return it within a reasonable time if neither it nor any attachment has been opened. Once a piece is opened, even if you reseal it, sending it back takes a new envelope and new postage. What happens next depends on the mail class printed on the piece.

Refusing a piece is not an opt-out request. When Marketing Mail with no endorsement comes back as refused, USPS simply discards it. To get off a list, contact the sender or use the opt-outs above.

What happens when you mark mail “Refused” (DMM 507 and 508)
Mail type	What USPS does with an unopened refused piece
First-Class Mail	Returns it to the sender with the reason for nondelivery
USPS Marketing Mail with no endorsement	Disposes of it; the sender doesn’t get it back
USPS Marketing Mail endorsed “Address Service Requested,” “Forwarding Service Requested,” or “Return Service Requested”	Returns it to the sender with no postage needed from you
Certified, Registered, insured, or COD mail already delivered	Can’t be refused postage-free after delivery; refuse it before signing instead
Any piece you’ve opened	Can’t be marked “Refused”; returning it needs a new envelope and postage

How do you stop sexually oriented ads in the mail?

Federal law gives you two tools, both filed on PS Form 1500, Application for Listing and/or Prohibitory Order. Under 39 U.S.C. § 3010, you can ask USPS to put your name and address on its list of people who don’t want sexually oriented advertisements. A mailer who sends you one more than 30 days after USPS adds your name may be subject to civil and criminal penalties, and the duty to check the list falls on the mailer, not USPS. You can file for your children under 19 who live with you. A listing lasts five years, and you must refile if you move.

The second tool, a prohibitory order under 39 U.S.C. § 3008, targets one mailer. If an ad offers something you consider “erotically arousing or sexually provocative,” you file PS Form 1500 at a Post Office with the ad and its opened envelope. The order requires that mailer to stop mailing you starting 30 days after it receives the order and to remove you from its lists. Under DMM 508.9.1.11, an order is void five years after it’s issued, or five years after your last request to enforce it.

A USPS Postal Bulletin notice says an online filing option at USPS.com/soa takes effect October 1, 2026. As of October 9, 2026, that page says online submission is “coming soon” and to keep filing PS Form 1500 at a Post Office.

How do you stop junk mail for someone who died?

Register the person on the ANA’s Deceased Do Not Contact List, which USPS links to from its page on mail for the deceased. Friends, relatives, and caregivers can register for a $6 fee. The listing is permanent, the file goes to subscribing companies monthly, and the ANA says to expect less promotional mail within three months.

For someone alive who can’t manage their own mail, the ANA’s Do Not Contact for Caretakers List costs $7 and permanently adds the person’s name, address, and email to its mail and email opt-out lists. The ANA says mail from companies or charities the person already deals with still needs a direct request.

Stopping the deceased person’s other mail is a separate step. USPS says that if you shared their address, you may open and manage their mail. To forward it to another address, the appointed executor or administrator must file a change of address in person at a Post Office with proof of that authority; a death certificate alone isn’t enough.

What junk mail can’t you stop?

Some mail keeps coming no matter which lists you join. USPS delivers mail as addressed, and its FAQ says mail goes to a residential or business address even if the name on it isn’t a current resident. Expect these to continue:

Bills, statements, and notices from accounts you hold. They aren’t marketing mail.
Political mail, which DMAchoice exempts.
Mail from charities, religious groups, alumni associations, and local merchants, unless you ask each one.
Offers from lenders and insurers that use their own customer lists rather than credit-bureau lists.
Saturation mail to “Current Resident” from businesses you haven’t contacted.

USPS FAQ: Refuse unwanted mail and remove your name from mailing lists

Does IRIS send junk mail?

No. IRIS is an independent print-and-mail service, not USPS, and it doesn’t send mailing-list campaigns or Every Door Direct Mail. It prints the US Letter-size PDF you upload and mails it by USPS First-Class Mail to the US address you enter, after you review the document, addresses, options, and total.

That makes it useful for the one-sender-at-a-time part of stopping junk mail: a written removal request to a catalog company or local business. A one-page black-and-white letter costs $3.20, including postage. IRIS can’t mail your Permanent Opt-Out Election form or any form that needs your handwritten signature, so send those yourself, and don’t upload documents containing your Social Security number or card details.

Sources & further reading

Product details checked against the IRIS API contract when this article was published. Platform references can change; consult the linked documentation when implementing.

Published by IRIS Postal Forms, operated by Great Lakes Computing Office LLC. Send a correction.

Put it into practice

Put your removal request in writing

Write a short letter asking a company to take you off its mailing list, save it as a US Letter-size PDF, and IRIS prints and mails it by USPS First-Class Mail to a US address. A one-page black-and-white letter is $3.20, with no stamps or envelope needed.

Mail a letter online ↗What happens to returned mail ↗