New Life Games LLC

General NLG Chat => Rants and Raves (SEE DESCRIPTION BEFORE ENTERING!) => Topic started by: GOS on October 28, 2016, 02:35:52 PM

Title: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: GOS on October 28, 2016, 02:35:52 PM: the USPS prints STAMPS and for the life of me I have no idea why? With numerous 3rd party vendors (STAMPS - PITNEY BOWES for ex) - and the post office doesn't even use them. The only purpose therefore for printing stamps are for users who don't do that much shipping - for 1st class letters etc; so why does the post office print $1.00 65c 71c and others? Since they seem to be printing various value stamps, and I occastionally ship 1st class packages outside of Ebay, I keep a supply of stamps on hand to ship packages thru my carrier and save running to the post office.
Since the standard 1st class package price that I use is $2.62 I tried to find a combination of stamps the USPS produces and could not come up with any combination of stamps that didn't add a pound to the weight of package. So I send a question to USPS - What Stamps do you offer that I can use for 1st class package value $2.62 - HERE IS THE ANSWER I GOT
Thank you for contacting your United States Postal Service.
I understand you're inquiring about which stamps to use on your package that will cover the $2.62 cost.
You can use the following combinations: (2) $1, (1) $.47 and (1) $.21 stamp or you can use (2) $1, (1) $.10 and (1) $.5 stamp. You can pretty much use any combination that best fits you to reach the total cost of $2.62.

THE MATH in case your interested $2.68 for option 1 and $2.15 for option 2. DAH!!!!!!
Title: Re: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: RB on October 28, 2016, 04:12:41 PM: That's funny. Don't give the cashier 3c extra for your $6.78 purchase. They've already seen you holding $10 in you hand and punched it into the register. Not capable of adding 3c to the amount of change they owe you. It's unbelievable.
Title: Re: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: hemiroid on October 28, 2016, 05:28:04 PM: The reply that you received, man there is no excuse for an answer like that!!!

Your reply should have been more like you can use any denomination or amount of stamps as long as the total equals at least the $2.68 price point that you figured. If you go a penny or two over no harm no foul, other than you are wasting your money. If you go a penny under you run the chance that a number checker will catch the shortage and send the package back to you.

Be careful using "forever" stamps. They are only worth what they were worth at the time of purchase and NOT the current First Class Letter value. So if you bought a bunch of "forever" stamps when a letter was 45Â¢ that stamp is still worth only 45Â¢ today. You will not be short if you use that stamp on a letter but you will be short when you use that stamp on a package expecting to get 49Â¢ for it.

The PO makes BIG money printing stamps that never get used! There are a lot of collectors buying up those paper stamps!

As to your point of printing postage on line, that is recommended even buy the PO. They do not have to pay an employee to service you when you are servicing yourself. Your computer is open 24/7 and you can print postage in your pajamas and have your carrier pick up your package at your door the next day at your normal delivery time.

You do realize that you can print shipping labels on line at www.USPS.com (http://www.USPS.com) as well as many other on line postage outlets and pay for them with your credit card or PayPal? You may never go to the PO again.

The person that handled your inquiry must have failed math. Maybe the schooling is better overseas and when they outsource customer service maybe then they will get it right? [sarchasm!!!]
Title: Re: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: cowboygames on October 28, 2016, 05:39:00 PM: Your information on forever stamps is wrong. Forever stamps are forever, doesn't matter what you paid or what it costs now. The whole point of forever stamps is that they are good for one first class letter and you don't have to buy penny stamps when the price changes. I've been using them for years. And I always get flag stamp rolls, no way for them to tell what I paid for them
Title: Re: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: GOS on October 28, 2016, 05:42:58 PM: you can't print 1st class postage on the usps website - you can on ebay - but not on the usps another ? with the post office. I only use stamps maybe once a month for special cases - so spending $10 or month or so to use STAMPS or get a PITNEY BOWES system is not feasible.
Title: Re: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: hemiroid on October 28, 2016, 08:02:31 PM: Just to be clear. Yes once you buy a "forever" stamp it will always and forever be good to mail a one ounce letter no matter when that stamp was purchased.

I did some checking and I stand corrected that a stamp was only worth the price paid when purchased. I found a blurb on the USPS website where the value of the Forever Stamp is the domestic First-Class Mail letter price in effect on the day of use.

So cowboy the point I was trying to make is if you want to send a $2.68 package you can use 6 "forever"stamps, 6 x 47 = $2.82. I thought that in this case they were only worth your purchase price but that info was wrong.

GOS, I thought the last time I used www.usps.com (http://www.usps.com) I could ship First Class up to a certain weight but that option looks gone? It looks like the cheapest online option they offer is now Priority mail. Me too, I'd never pay a service fee just to print postage. I'd rather donate that 16Â¢ overpayment for the little amount of package business I do as well.

So to get back on topic...I agree with your frustration over the math skills in your PO response. That is just NOT right. I'm just glad that I didn't have to do much math in my response.
Title: Re: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: RB on October 28, 2016, 08:12:45 PM: I been told you can print first class postage on USPS.com if you have a business account. Maybe someone can verify this. I just use PayPal shipping for first class & usually for Priority as well since USPS.com discontinued the online discount for non business accounts. Works well for me. Just log in to PayPal then use this link:

https://www.paypal.com/shiplabel/create/ (https://www.paypal.com/shiplabel/create/)
Title: Re: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: GOS on October 29, 2016, 03:03:31 AM: that link to paypal did not work for me. do not find any link to printing labels.
Title: Re: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: RB on October 29, 2016, 06:07:50 AM: It works for me. Did you log in first? If not that link will bring up the log in screen.
Title: Re: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: GOS on October 29, 2016, 06:51:35 AM: logged on first - then went to the link you mention and that does go to a print label procedure - however - seems to be a cumbersome way to access - could not find a direct link within paypal other that what you mention.
Title: Re: USPS - no wonder they lose so much money.
Post by: sirius7 on October 29, 2016, 01:39:03 PM: This is the link I use to buy shipping via PayPal:

https://www.paypal.com/us/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_ship-now (https://www.paypal.com/us/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_ship-now)