USPS January Rate Hike, Part 1: First Class, Media Mail

by: lessthanthreerecords

Prices are up, up, up. Service is down, down, down. I'm old enough to remember when any local postmaster would actually assist you in opening an insurance claim. Now, they won't even discuss anything to do with insurance claims, despite hard-selling insurance at checkout. I'm insuring less than ever because every time there's an issue, I need to spend countless hours AND get Congress involved just to pay out a claim (and even then, it takes the better part of a year). At least the mail is functioning better than it was in late 2020/early 2021, but probably still worse than at any time prior. Fire DeJoy!

by: iheartjacksparrow

@lessthanthreerecords - I'm old enough to remember when there were two mail deliveries a day, and a first class stamp was 3 cents.

by: Rexford

I went to the post office this morning at 9:05 am. 12 people waiting outside for them to open. At 9:20am they still had not opened. Most of us left. This is very common in my city.

The service is the worst in my lifetime. They just don't care. There is normally one employee there at any given time and I live in a densly populated city.

by: ShortSeller

USPS can go to hell for the criminal racket it has become. Everyone is busy clapping like seals for Uktraine while the national postal system is hijacked and the public extorted. A joke.

by: The End

The whole "Market Dominant" classification is bogus.
USPS is the ONLY mail service in America.
The "Market Dominant" thing makes it sound like USPS has competition.
Word Salad has become a constant diet of the Elite.
They just sound stupid while pulling the wool over the eyes of the public.

by: UB

lessthanthreerecords  You must mean "Fire Dejoy" and the entire Board of Governors! That will not solve the problem of USPS expenses going up with less mail volume. Your answer to postal rates not going up must be that we go back to USPS receiving direct funding each year from the Federal taxpayers. Many big things happening including consolidation of carriers moving out of Post Offices to Sorting & Delivery Centers across the Country where it can be done. This should start soon and continue over the next few years. This is a major part of how USPS will reduce the number of employees by 50,000.

by: 1st Armored Div. 1971-1973

I had to track down my mailman to find out why he was not picking up my mail. He said he did not see it. It was a 12x11x1 inch package, all white, less than 3 inches from the mailbox.

I understand we can miss things at times but when it happens every day, day after day, there is something wrong.

by: Whatever

scratching my head trying to figure out just exactly what I can do now to re-invent my ability to earn a living. How many other seniors are doing the same since no one can actually live on SIIS. I'm in a small rural town and if they close our PO then what? We'd have nothing else since the bank is closed now - no gas stations - no grocery store - heck we don't even have a police force now. Close the PO? Just throw in the towel

by: Stone Cutter

***I love my USPS Post Office***

1) My local postal crew are sharp minded, friendly, and is run by a fantastic female manager.

2) This summer, the postal service launched new software that is more efficient and gets customers through post office lines much faster.

3) From the West Coast, my Priority packages takes only 2 days for East Coast delivery. Before DeJoy, packages to the East Coast took 3-4 days.

4) USPS recently purchased electric vehicles with larger cabin space for packages. This will save USPS a bunch of money on gas while eliminating a carbon footprint.

And yes, I clap like a seal for Ukraine because I find the future of democracy to be MORE IMPORTANT than our postal service that is already 99% efficient.  

by: wrslss1222

Very simple, there is nothing we can do about the Post Office rate hikes as long as Democrats are in the White House.  The Democrats like to spend, spend, spend no matter how it affects people.  Inflation is the highest, and now gas prices will be increasing again.  Democrats could care less that the Post Office is raising rates at a rate that will put small on line businesses out of business.  If DeJoy wasn't so power hungry he would have ordered a complete audit of the Postal Service procedures and stream lined them to decrease costs.  I can say he is power hungry because I talked to someone who reports to him.  So, people, keep voting Democrat and watch the United States crumble.  

by: Cbaker

StoneCutter 😂🤣

by: Mark4

Wow the post office already priced itself out of the market, priority mail packages are now cheaper to ship through UPS. Looks like USPS is gonna double down on stupid. lol

by: Rexford

Clap like a seal for Ukraine? Damn, how cold.  I hope that you are never caught in a war with death and destruction all around you.  

by: NYSteve

lessthanthreerecords and UB-

you mean 'fire the guy who didnt fire DeJoy already' is more like it
if dismantling the postal guts during a huge mail-in election wasnt the epitomy of
stupid (leaving corruption out of it for this argument), nothing he can do can top that!

by: NYSteve

@Shortseller- i like many others 'clap like seals' for UK, AND cant stomach what the USPS has become...is that connected somehow?

by: NYSteve

@Stone Cutter- good for you, now read the 100 postings vs your 1 posting, for some perspective

by: Calling You Out

Re: wrslss1222,

Dejoy was placed as the Postmaster General by Trump because he was a large campaign donor. Furthermore, the majority of the PRC were nominated by Republicans.

by: Marie

@wrslss1222
"...there is nothing we can do about the Post Office rate hikes as long as Democrats are in the White House."  

WOW, either you aren't aware of DeJoy's history or you are willing to blame stuff on the Dems that they had NOTHING to do with.  DeJoy is a personal friend of former Pres. Trump.  It was former Pres Trump that gave DeJoy the job as Postermaster.  Many Many Many things DeJoy did to upend USPS happened during the Trump presidency.  You may want to do a bit more research on this topic so you can get the facts.

"If DeJoy wasn't so power hungry he would have ordered a complete audit of the Postal Service procedures and stream lined them to decrease costs.  I can say he is power hungry because I talked to someone who reports to him.  So, people, keep voting Democrat and watch the United States crumble. "

So now you know it wasn't the Democrats that had anything to do with giving this job to Dejoy, but in fact it was a Republican president, do you feel the same way as you stated above?  And if you don't, why?

by: Marie

@Stone Cutter
I have no problem believing there are pockets within the US that the USPS functions very well for you.

For me, for the most part they function well for me too, but we have a major sorting hub that is having increasingly more and more problems over the past 2 years.  It hasn't improved and is contently having significant issues due to not enough employees and equipment to do the job they are tasked with doing.

Yet Dejoy seems to think the way to improve these kinds of issues is to give the consumers back to back fee increases.  They are literally back to back.  And even worse than that if you consider we had a few increases in 2022.  January, July and October, with one following again in January of 2023 on the very day the Oct. 2022 increase stops.

by: Dragonfyree

Media mail just had a huge price increase this year.  As most of my merchandise are books it's almost priced me out of the market.  

I even think my shipping is high and I know what it costs me.  I had always bought a lot of books on Ebay, but now it's cheaper on Amazon in most cases.