Holding mail at the post office

Planning to go away over the holidays for several weeks, is there a form I can pick up at the post office in order to pause mail delivery and if so how does it look/what do I need to ask for?

Yes, there is, but I wouldn't bother. I did that once, and they didn't do anything. I left for 6 weeks, set it up properly for them to hold my mail at the post office and was charged for the service. When I got home 6 weeks later, my mailbox was pouring over so badly there was literally a huge pile of my mail on the ground in front of it. I went to the post office to get a refund, and they refused saying that my mail had been held. So I asked her to give me my held mail, and she said I didn't get any. Fuckers. I never did get my refund, though admittedly I didn't make a huge fuss about it. I was just too busy at the time.

Until a couple of years ago the service used to be free and we used it - worked fine.

Thats changed & its no longer free - so we enagge a helpful neighbour for the task. All the free "newspapers" have to be disposed of anyway...

We used it in September this year and it worked great.

This is what you need!

We had our mail stored in September, worked perfectly.
Arranged it all online, got a confirmation mail AND a confirmation letter a few days later.
They started delivering again exactly the date we had stated.
So absolutely no complaint from our part - except we got 2 catalogues that were not meant for us, but that does not bother us, rather the person they were meant for.

In order not to receive any junk I put a sign on the box saying "Keine Werbung einwerfen" - which seemed to work at first. Until some of our nerdy neigbours must have taken it of, cos my friend who I'd asked to check once a week said the sign was on the box when she first checked, but then it has been taken off.
In our house they don't seem to like handwritten pink signs glued on postboxes instead of properly printed metal signs...

I use this every time I go away for more than a week. It has never failed me so far though I can feel IPJ's frustration!

You have to set it up at least seven days beforehand.

And they deliver everything at once on the day you get back, so if that doesn't fit in your letterbox then they leave a note and you have to go to the post office to collect it. Still better than having it heaped up outside your front door though.

when my husband and I were on holidays last year we got our mail diverted to his parents house in Sachsen. This worked fine, although they only divert the important letters etc, not any papers or magazines which you may have ordered.
I think this costed us 30 euros for 7 weeks.

Thanks for that link gooner_gal, I never would've found that on my own.