Advertising leaflets shoved en masse into mail boxes are one of the banes of modern society.
In Germany, putting a note saying "Bitte keine Werbung" ("No advertising please") on your box protects you from them - advertisers who repeatedly ignore the note face heavy fines.
Is there a standard English phrase that is widely used in this specific context?
I've never seen such a thing specifically in the US, but the phrase No Solicitation (or No Solicitations) is often posted in public places (or at private businesses) where activities like posting advertisements, handing out fliers, or asking for donations are not allowed.
I haven't seen one for many years, but the standard sign in the South of England used to be No circulars or hawkers.
I think you'd see No circulars or junk mail more often today, but I doubt if people delivering leaflets ever take any notice of such signs.
In Australia it's very common to see a "No Junk Mail" sticker. Less commonly you might see "Authorised Australia Post Mail Only" or "Addressed Mail Only".
The classic version is "no circulars" in the UK, but it's totally ineffective, as there's no legal backing for it.
Advertising flyers - frequently glossed as "pizza leaflets" from the endless supply that pizza firms stuff through every letterbox in their delivery area, seemingly daily - are a common bane of life in the UK, and there's no right to stop them being delivered.
In the US, the issue doesn't arise in the first place, because they don't have letterboxes in the way Europe does. European houses have a "letterbox" (though there is often no actual box) on the front door, and anyone can put something into it. Leaflets from politicians and from local advertisers are common. Newspapers are also usually delivered this way to subscribers. All sorts of delivery services, including the mail, deliver letters and small parcels (e.g. CDs, DVDs, paperback books) this way.
In US, though, you have a "mailbox", which is at the roadside, not on the doorfront. These are the classic ones on a post with a little red flag to indicate that there is new mail. Only the US Mail and the resident can put things in - and the resident can put letters in for the US Mail to collect, unlike the European system of only being able to put outgoing post into a pillarbox. It's a criminal offence to interfere with anyone else's mailbox, for the same reasons that it's a criminal offence to intercept or interfere with the mail in most countries.
I see "no flyers please" and "no junk mail" stickers (and handmade signs) on many people's letter boxes (the personally-owned things you attach to the outside of your house, near the front door) in Canada. I don't know if they work or not. They certainly don't carry the force of the law.
The language used in Philadelphia's municipal ordinance is as a circular free property
In the United States, only the United States Postal Service (USPS) is allowed to place items directly into mailboxes.
For this reason companies that distribute unaddressed advertisements mostly use door hangers or sticky notes. Some local service companies will place a business card in a small plastic bag with a rock, and lob it onto the property. There is no reliable way to control this behavior without neighborhood hostile dogs or locked gates.
In Australia: "no junk mail", "no advertising material", "no unaddressed advertising material"...
In Canada you can register with Canada Post to NOT RECEIVE ANY - admail / direct mail/ which is all non - addressed mail. It's called Consumer Choice. When the mail is sorted at the depots and each postal employee will note your slot with a red dot so they know that they don't presort anything into your bundle.
The problem is ... you may not want a food flyer or a pizza flyer but maybe that free magazine or Direct mail magazine with all the savings from time to time. You have to be all or nothing!
