Use a privacy portal when it offers a mail-only choice

If a company's privacy portal lists a choice about postal marketing, consider that choice before a full deletion request. A deletion request may remove records you want the company to keep, and it may not say anything about printed advertising. Read every control the portal offers, then pick the one whose description covers the mail you want to stop.

By Junk Mail Magic. Updated October 2, 2026.

Read the portal before you click

Open the portal from the company's own website by typing the address or using your own bookmark. Do not use a link printed on the mailer or sent by email.
List every control the page offers. Look for wording about mail, postal marketing, promotions or sharing, and note which choices say they apply only to email, texts or the website.
Check which name and address the portal will act on. Compare them with the label on the piece you received, because a different spelling may point to a separate record.
Choose the control whose description covers printed advertising. If none clearly does, use the portal's contact option and ask whether a mail-only choice exists.

Deletion, access and mail choices can be separate

A portal may treat a request to delete data, a request to see data and a request to stop advertising mail as separate controls with separate results. Many portals describe what each control will and will not do. Read that text before you confirm.

If you live in California, DROP is a separate state process. It sends deletion requests to participating registered data brokers. It does not cover first-party data, so it does not replace a choice you make with a company you deal with directly, and it does not guarantee that postal mail stops. Keep your DROP ID private and do not enter it in a company portal.

Private portal checklist

Example for your own use. Replace the bracketed details and review what you share.

Company: [name] Portal reached from: [official site page] Controls offered: [list] Control I selected: [exact label] Name and address it applies to: [as shown] Date submitted: [date] Confirmation wording: [paste text] Still unclear: [question to ask]

Record the exact control and confirmation

Before you submit, copy the exact label of the control you chose. After you submit, save the confirmation message. If another mailing arrives, compare it with that wording and ask the company which record produced it. If the portal offered only deletion, write to the company's listed privacy contact and ask it to stop postal marketing to your address.

Official source

CalPrivacy: How DROP Works

Find postal marketing language in a privacy policy Ask about promotional mail after a data-deletion response Request less mail without requesting every customer record Ask whether a postal preference covers partner sharing Privacy and marketing lists All practical mail guides

Choose the route that matches the mailing

Use the official route described in this guide for this kind of mail. For a separate ordinary advertisement, Junk Mail Magic can help prepare a sender-specific removal request.

Compare removal routes