Online prices for some postage will be a little cheaper
May 6th, 2008 | by mbhunter |The US Postal Service will be raising their prices on Monday, May 12th, 2008. The first-class stamp won’t be the only service that will be getting more expensive.
The Priority Mail Flat Rate Envelopes and Boxes will also be getting more expensive. These are the services I use to mail items for customers of my eBay store. They’ve raised prices before but this time around there are two tiers of pricing: retail and commercial. One of the postal employees helped me to track down that I’d be charged the cheaper commercial rate if I used Click-N-Ship® to buy my postage. Here’s the difference for domestic flat-rate shipping:
| Size | Old rate | New Comm. | New Retail |
| Envelope | $4.60 | $4.75 | $4.80 |
| Small Box | $8.95 | $9.30 | $9.80 |
| Large Box | $12.95 | $12.50 | $12.95 |
The big flat-rate box will get a little bit cheaper online than it is now, and the envelope and the small box will get slightly more expensive, but not as much as they’ll be if I don’t use Click-N-Ship.
Click-N-Ship saves the USPS money because it reduces the labor that the USPS needs to expend and centralizes the accounting. The local post office never really touches the money with Click-N-Ship. They receive a credit for processing the package. (A few times I put the wrong origination ZIP code on the front when I printed the label, and they asked me to change it to theirs when I mailed it with them. It seems silly for me to do this — why do I need to tell them where I sent the package from? — but it must have something to do with their accounting system.)
But at least I get a cheaper rate and free delivery confirmation with Click-N-Ship. I’m glad they pass the savings along a little bit.
