Wiktionary
n. the postal facility that deals with mail that cannot be delivered
Wikipedia
A dead letter office (DLO) is a facility within a postal system where undeliverable mail is dealt with. Mail is considered to be undeliverable when the address is invalid so it cannot be delivered to addressee, and there is no return address so it cannot be returned to the sender.
At a DLO, mail is usually opened to try to find an address to forward to. If an address is found, the envelope is usually sealed using tape or postal seals, or enclosed in plastic bags and delivered. If the letter or parcel is still undeliverable, valuable items are then auctioned off while the correspondence is usually destroyed. Despite this practice, in the past some undeliverable envelopes were acquired by philatelists.
Dead letter offices go by different names in different countries. Other names include returned letter office or undeliverable mail office.
Dead Letter Office is a rarities and B-sides collection by R.E.M., released in 1987. The album is essentially a collection of many additional recordings R.E.M. made pre- Murmur to Lifes Rich Pageant that were outtakes or released as flip sides to their singles internationally. Many of the tracks are favorite cover versions indicating the band's disparate influences and musical tastes, including three Velvet Underground covers, and songs by Pylon, Aerosmith and Roger Miller.
Guitarist Peter Buck composed wry, self-deprecating (and, in one instance, apologetic) liner notes to the songs on the album. Buck initially had doubts about releasing it, saying he felt as though people would perceive the album as the band "trying to cash in, maybe to sell some records," as the ultimate release date predated that of the band's final studio album with I.R.S., Document, by a mere five months.
The album was initially issued as a 15-song collection on vinyl and cassette, but when its CD edition appeared (now the only available edition of Dead Letter Office) the five tracks from the band's 1982 Chronic Town EP were added. This is also the only current CD availability of Chronic Town.
Dead Letter Office originally reached #52 in the U.S. and #60 in the UK. Referring to the album in 2003, Pitchfork Media were favourable, saying the album was "such a blast" due to it possessing a certain "kind of drunken studio fuckery."
Dead Letter Office is a 1998 Australian film starring Miranda Otto.
Usage examples of "dead letter office".
At the end, the dud ups and disappears and you find out he used to work in the dead letter office.
I may be addressing it to nothing but a sort of cosmic Dead Letter Office, but that can't be helped.
And she'd sent the e-mail to the late Arnold Griner, the dead letter office, so to speak.
The report was this: that Bartleby had been a subordinate clerk in the Dead Letter Office at Washington, from which he had been suddenly removed by a change in the administration.
I did so, but my letter came back, appropriately enough, through the dead letter office.