As promised, the USPS is raising rates twice a year instead of once, and beginning July 10, 2022, it will cost more to mail a letter or send a package via Media Mail. The USPS characterized the change to First Class Mail rates as going up 6.5%.
The USPS is also raising rates for certain services, including Mailbox rentals (6.8% higher), and money orders (14.4% higher). In addition, the Postal Service is seeking price adjustments for insurance and for Certified Mail.
Today’s announcement impacts “market dominant” rates (letter stamps, First Class Mail, and Media Mail). The USPS has yet to announce new rates for “competitive” services including Priority Mail and First Class Package Service (FCPS) – stay tuned.
The price of a First-Class Mail Forever stamp will rise from 58 cents to 60 cents on July 10th. The single-piece letter additional ounce price will increase from 20 cents to 24 cents (making a 2-ounce letter rise from 78 cents to 84 cents)
The cost of sending a 1-ounce letter to other countries would increase to $1.40, up from $1.30.
In announcing the marketing dominant rate hike, the USPS said, “As inflation and increased operating expenses continue, these price adjustments will help with the implementation of the Delivering for America plan, including a $40 billion investment in core Postal Service infrastructure over the next ten years. With the new prices, the Postal Service will continue to provide the lowest letter-mail postage rates in the industrialized world and offer a great value in shipping.”
Details are available in today’s filing on the Postal Regulatory Commission’s website.
Note: We wrote about the rates that will most impact online sellers. OMG takes a look and says volume mailers will be hit hard, including marketers and publishers (check out the rate increase for periodicals).
So if they raise prices in July, that would be the 2nd increase, does that mean they won’t add a holiday seasonal increase in Oct. or is that consider “seasonal”. I honestly don’t think the USPS will make it to the 10 year mark at this rate. I mean they just lost about half my packages Sunday, I’ve figure for every rate increase is the same decrease in sales which would mean I’ll be priced out in about 2-3 years.
The POs costs related to postal insurance are primarily claims which are driven by the PO not doing their job.
I am starting to question if USPS is purposefully driving away business so they in turn have substantially less volume and can cut back on staffing, facilities etc. I have shipped more via UPS and FedEx in the last four months than I have in five years combined selling on eBay. The price difference is frequently as much as 40-50%.
Its the Post master general DeJoy, he’s trying to end the USPS. Congress just passed a bill giving the PO over 100 billion dollars grant, change the retirement plan to medicare(which saves them billions each year) so they won’t be losing money every year.
I overcharge for shipping with the solid understanding that any remainder is returned to the customer.
USPS is so unpredictable this is the ONLY tactic that works 100% of the time.
I encourage all to use the same approach.
But it will only work with complete honesty.
I’m not seeing an increase for Media Mail in the announcement, as indicated above in the first sentence of the article.
USPS announcement: https://about.usps.com/newsroom/national-releases/2022/0406-usps-new-prices-for-2022.htm
Media went up at the beginning of the year, the first lb. going from $2.89 to $3.19, an increase of 10.4%. Some heavier packages went up as high as 12.1%. But I don’t see any new increases for July.
They didn’t put all details in the press release, go to PRC website:
See the line in the story above at the end “Details are available in today’s filing on the Postal Regulatory Commission’s website” – there’s a hyperlink going to PRC website. When there, do Control-F (find) and enter the word Media, hit return – shows the table. Hope that helps.
I see it now, Ina, thanks. Hefty increase, considering it’s a mid-year add on. Strange that they didn’t list Media in the more general announcement as a class that would be impacted. Trying to spare up of too much bad news.