Are "forever" USA postage stamps sold at the current first class mailprice?...

On Wed, 16 Apr 2008 08:49:53 -0700, Sir F. A. Rien wrote:

True, but one nut - according to my local postmistress - purchased
thousands of them! as mass mailers don't use FC ... ???

Some mailers use FC presort, on which they get a discount -- let's say
they pay $0.30/piece now for the service (I think that's about right.)
If they were to stock up on "Forever" stamps at $0.41 each now, and wait
until the presort rate exceeded $0.41, that might not be too bad. The
same could be said for waiting until Bulk Rate exceeded $0.41, but that
would be longer.

Of course, right now, postal rate increases are pegged to inflation, so
they would be better off putting the money into something that
appreciates faster. Also (heresy?) there's really no guarantee that in
ten or twenty years the USPS will honor its agreement about the Forever
stamp, or even exist!

But, bad idea as stockpiling may be, it apparently kept the USPS from
issuing Forever stamps in coils. They are only available in "convertible
booklets", which are very difficult for machines to manipulate.
*Someone* was worried about stockpiling by bulk mailers.

--
Joshua McGee ‹(•¿•)›
APS, ATA, ISWSC, AFDCS, MBPC, MCC, BPS
Pasadena, California, USA
http://www.mcgees.org/stamp-offers/

On Wed, 16 Apr 2008 08:51:37 -0700, Sir F. A. Rien wrote:
Time to change countries ... I get 6.3% post taxation ...

On short-term deposits? I can only swing 4.25%, pre-taxation. Where is
your money?

--
Joshua McGee ‹(•¿•)›
APS, ATA, ISWSC, AFDCS, MBPC, MCC, BPS
Pasadena, California, USA
http://www.mcgees.org/stamp-offers/

Post offices are businesses and do nothing that isn't designed to make
money.

Fortunately that is not strictly true for the USPS, unless you consider
benevolent actions to be accounted under "goodwill" expenditures.

Examples: Pictorial cancel programs, temporary stations, favor cancels,
free first-day cancel service (and return through the mailstream in a
free cardboard-and-plastic mailer to protect the cover.) All of these
are expenditures, and fortunately they are still pursued. There is still
a lot of philatelic ground covered by the USPS.

But your point can be highlighted in one profound way: unlike many other
countries, we do not issue "Forever" commemoratives. Unless this is "in
the works", the reason has to be a conclusion that the market that buys
commemoratives (mostly philatelists) will not cease buying stamps because
they are not "Forever" stamps.

Every time I go to a Post Office and see a clerk pull a sheet of
commemoratives out of a drawer to frank a customer's letter, I want to
hug him or her. I always make a point to thank the clerk. On the other
hand, why anyone in the world would wait in line at the post office to
buy one $0.41 stamp to mail one half-ounce letter is beyond me. It
doesn't make any more sense to me with the people who come in and set a
stack of twenty half-ounce First Class letters on the counter, and let
the clerk hand-apply every single stamp for them. I must admit that in
their shoes I would probably say, "Here, let me sell you this booklet of
20 stamps, and you go over to that counter and put the stamps on the
letters. When you are done, put them in that magic slot over there, and
they will get to their destinations." Then again, customer service has
never been my strong suit.

I saw a lady one time go up to the counter and ask for stamps. The
obliging clerk pulled out an album filled with the last year's
commemoratives -- wonderful, colorful, topical, and exciting stamps. The
woman said, "No, I just need plain old stamps." And so she was given a
coil of those horrid "Flag Over Porch" stamps. Can't say the clerk
didn't try.

--
Joshua McGee ‹(•¿•)›
APS, ATA, ISWSC, AFDCS, MBPC, MCC, BPS
Pasadena, California, USA
http://www.mcgees.org/stamp-offers/

On Apr 14, 1:28*pm, the zak wrote:
Are "forever" USA postage stamps sold at the current first class mail
price?... how does that work?...
Does that mean it's a more economical consumer choice when buying
stamps for letters?...

This is the way the system worked:
July 29, 1998 USPS issued a NVI stamp for breast cancer research, (32c
+8c) or 40 cents at the window until January 9, 1999. If you went to
the window a day later, January 10. 1999 the same stamp would still
cost 40 cents, however the numbers change to (33c + 7c), cancer
research loses a penny.
January 7, 2001 the same stamp is 40 cents now (34c + 6c), cancer
loses another penny.
March 23, 2002 the same stamp will now cost you 45c BUT now the
numbers are (34c + 11c), cancer is going to recover some, if the
stamps sell.
Flash forward 97 days. Yhe price is still 45c but the numbers change
to ( 37c + 8c).
Sales of the Cancer stamp were suspended January 1. 2004, resumed
February 2, 2004 through December 31, 2005.
Take the Forever stamps as a grain of salt and be wary of USPS pricing
policy.

Ralphael, the OLD one