"Victor Manta" wrote in message ...
----------------
In Linn's Stamp News, August 10, 2016, from the article: "Why the U.S.
Postal Service’s net losses for the year are growing" by Bill McAllister, I
learned as follows:
"One of the changes USPS made in the quarter was a revision to how many
stamps are held by the public.
That revision added $1 billion to postal revenues in the latest quarter.
The Postal Service does not record postage as a revenue item until the stamp
purchased is used in the mail. It notes how many stamps the public has
purchased and records this number as a “deferred revenue-prepaid postage
liability.” "
--------------------
Sir Rien, David, thank you for commenting. Your interesting comments pushed
me to look a bit further.
In the same article it is written, in the beginning of it: "The price
reduction cut the price of a first-class letter-rate stamp to 47¢ from 49¢,
effective April 10."
I haven't correlated this piece of information to the one that I quoted
earlier but perhaps they have something in common. In accountancy terms for
each forever stamp that USPS sold previously to the public it owes now 2¢
less than earlier. This difference could be considered a net gain, that can
be computed and added to the "postal revenues in the latest quarter". The $1
billion amount is maybe coming from here.
We can infer even more. Because USPS told us that: "That revision added $1
billion ...", and we talk about approximatively 4 percent (more exactly 2¢
divided by 49¢) of the whole, we can infer that the total value of stamps
hold by the customers of the USPS is about $25 billion. In other words, the
public is constantly crediting USPS with this amount (one that counts, like
everything in large amounts).
Please notice that I don't speak here about older stamps held by collectors,
many of which lost a good part of their value due to postal prices
inflation, that was higher than the general one. I remember that we
discussed this latter subject here many years ago.
Victor Manta, PWO
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Philatelic Webmasters Organization:
http://pwmo.org/
Art on Stamps:
http://artonstamps.org/
Romania by Stamps:
http://marci-postale.com/
Communism on Stamps:
http://reds-on.postalstamps.biz/
Spanish North Africa:
http://www.sna-on.postalstamps.biz/
----------------------------------------------------------------------------