I've just finished checking and responding to the latest batch of QSL cards received via the ZL bureau:
Having counted and weighed 100 random cards (=320 grams), then tidied up and weighed the whole pile (=2,269 grams) I estimate that there are about 700 cards in that batch.
Checking and dealing with the cards took me about an hour to process each 100 cards, so that's roughly 7 hours, plus a bit of time messing around with the logging software, arranging for reply cards to be printed and sent and what-have-you - let's say another 3 hours giving about 10 hours in total, a rate of about 70 cards per hour.
By comparison, I downloaded and processed the ~5,000 LoTW confirmations received so far this year in just 5 minutes, which works out at 60,000 LoTW confirmations per hour.
Bottom line: processing LoTW confirmations is nearly 1,000 times quicker than processing QSL cards, and a LOT less tedious. On the other hand, there are some nice cards in that batch, and it's interesting to discover a bit more about the people at the far end.
PS Having sorted the cards to file them in my shoeboxes, I appear to have more than 5 kg of JA cards, that's more than 1,500. The Japanese clearly love their paper QSLs.
