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Post Office Wants To Raise Stamp Prices
July 7, 2010
The U.S. Postal Service announced Tuesday that it wants to raise the price of first class postage by two cents.
The price of a first class stamp would jump two cents from 44 to 46 cents. The price of a postcard would increase 2 cents to 30 cents, as the price for other services would jump an average of 5 percent.
The Postal Regulatory Commission must approve the recommended price changes. The increases would not go into effect until January 2, 2011. It would be the first stamp price increase in almost two years.
Faced with plummeting mail volume traced to the recession and increased use of the Internet, the Postal Service is projecting a deficit of nearly $7 billion for the next fiscal year. Despite eliminating millions work hours and reducing expenses by more than $1 billion every year since 2001, a budget gap remains.
The proposed price changes, if approved, will raise about $2.3 billion for the first nine months of 2011. Postmaster General John E. Potter said he does not want customers to bear the burden of dramatic price increases. Instead, Potter announced in March that pricing would be one in a series of solutions the Postal Service is pursuing to become financially sound.
“There is no one single solution to the dire financial situation that the Postal Service faces,” Potter said. “These proposed rate adjustments are moderate and part of a fair and balanced approach to insuring mail service for all Americans well into the future.”
The Post Office has also outlined plans to cut Saturday mail delivery.
Other actions outlined in March included the restructuring prepayments of retiree health benefits, creating a more flexible workforce and expanding access to products and services to places more convenient to customers.
Pictured: The Simpsons were honored a new 44 cent stamp introduced in May, 2009.
Comments
9 Responses to “Post Office Wants To Raise Stamp Prices”
REGARDING:
“What happen to nither rain,sleet or dark of night.”
Pony Express motto, and went out of business quickly
David the Cliff wannabe
What happen to nither rain,sleet or dark of night.You are lucky if you get your mail.Cliff on cheers was a great mail man
I guess I COULD check, but then what would I gripe about???
>I could pay them online but have to mail a check to ECUA (or maybe drive down to make a payment in person, but that makes a one dollar stamp sound cheap).
Does you bank offer free bill pay? Or perhaps one of your credit cards? I’ve used my financial institution’s bill pay service for ECUA since day one. No issues, no costs, no fees. And no trash by the road, so it appears ECUA is happy.
REGARDING:
“I am thinking seriously now of having my payments come directly from my checking account or paying online. The US Postal Service is pricing themselves out of business.”
Yep, I do whenever possible. I hated when ECUA took over from Waste Management because I could pay them online but have to mail a check to ECUA (or maybe drive down to make a payment in person, but that makes a one dollar stamp sound cheap).
Every time they raise their rates they encourage folks to find other ways to communicate and do business. I can imagine a point in the future when somebody is told, “Since you’re the only person still using the postal service, we’ll have to charge you ten billion dollars per stamp.”
I think it was the Postmaster General who had an alternate solution to his money woes a few years back: charge each email at the rate of a first class stamp. That would make them plenty of money as they had no expenses in providing the service. Al Gore should have held onto the Internet back when it was only costing the federal government five to ten million dollars per year to operate.
On the other hand, you can imagine what shape it would be in by now if they had.
David for progress
I agree with Bob. You can’t even go to the post office after work! They close at 4:00!
Some of us pay for a post office box and the rates keep increasing for a 4×4 space I pay dearly and the mail still is not placed properly. They put my mail in other boxes and others in my box. Learn to read or pay attention to your work.
Everyone should go purchase forever stamps before the price rises. I have about 5 items I have to mail monthly and I am thinking seriously now of having my payments come directly from my checking account or paying online. The US Postal Service is pricing themselves out of business.
Here we go again. It’s not bad enough that we have to process our neighbors mail on a weekly basis, but they are wanting more for doing a pitiful job. Where I live we get certified mail and have to drive 20 miles to the Post Office only to find irregular hours and have to wait for an hour or make a second trip. There’s more but I had better close.
This is such bad business. people are using alternatives for mailing these days.
So to make people use the post office more, their idea is to RAISE the price? Yeah that will make them come (that was sarcasm).
People are trying to save money anywhere they can, so why would you charge more and cut services. People want more for less NOT less for more!!
But after all it is a Government run agency right?