Post Office will be opening your Media Mail

My Post Office ^ | 6/15/2004 | gasshog

[Gasshog]

Folks the gubmint continues to insult your intellegence, because it is so easy to see through this ploy. USPS wants to get rid of the Media rate, instead of just doing so they will waste $$$ of dollars now using extra materials, time and manpower to rip open every Media mail package, check its contents and reseal it (if it meets Media mail standards of course). Is this cheaper than "losing" money because of people who abuse Media mail by not following the standards? The Post Office would like you to believe this I suppose. The real agenda is to compel everyone to quit using it and make you buy the higher priced services.

What everyone who is upset about this should do!!

Wrap your media mail REALLY GOOD... if you put that little item in 10-12 sucessively larger boxes and use a roll of tape to seal it all up, get the picture?

IF enough people will do this USPS will drop this nonsense pretty fast.

[Xenalyte]

I ship books that I sell on eBay via media mail, and for fear of dampness, I wrap the holy hell out of 'em. (I warn the buyers that they'll have to go through several layers of plastic.) They're usually inside six or seven plastic bags, then a gallon Ziploc, and then the box. Now I'll get to put tape around each layer.

[Judith Anne]

I don't understand. What is media mail? Books? CDs? What?

[Bacon Man]

Ping!

[Xenalyte]

It's what used to be called "book rate."

[Xenalyte]

Beat you to it!

[Xenalyte]

Yo PJ, whatcha think of this?

[Steely Tom]

I'd hold off 'till I heard this from a slightly more authoritative source.

(steely)

[proxy_user]

Books, but not magazines.

CDs, but not ROM cartridges.

[snooker]

UPS ping. Cheaper as well.

Before long the USPS won't have anything to do but go to union meetings.

[QQQQQ]

"the clerks had to open the mail themselves."

Our tax dollars at work....

[Military family member]

Are we talking about Second Class Mail here? the rate for periodicals?

[Military family member]

Good, maybe I can stop getting all the damn AOL trial disks. I have enough free minutes now to use AOL for the next ten years.

[STFrancis]

Considering the amount of mail the post office delivers I think this is hog wash. However, I send a email to someone with pretty good knowledge within USPS and will post his reply here....

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

I've used Media Mail to ship computer disks (i.e. floppies) and VHS/audio cassettes as well.

[Moose4]

Pinging the wife unit since she sells some of her used books on eBay and half.com, and ships them Media Mail. The rates are actually quite reasonable and we've never had any trouble with the USPS.

}:-)4

[MizSterious]

A postal clerk I spoke to the other day said that when using media mail, we can't even include an invoice. I'm hoping that's wrong. I buy and sell books on eBay and amazon, and we need to include invoices. Sounds like they just want us to use the higher rates. (I do sometimes anyway, especially for rare books.)

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

When in doubt, go to the source.

USPS.Com - Media Mail

[HungarianGypsy]

I'd be worried about getting an empty envelope mailed to me. "Hmm! I like this book. Ummm! I need to set this aside to investigate in my spare time. Reseal the envelope and send it on its way."

[KarlInOhio]

UPS ping. Cheaper as well.

Media mail is dirt cheap compared to anything else. I entered a 10 pound package from Ohio to California.

UPS Ground = $11.45.
USPS Parcel Post= $18.14
USPS Media Mail = $4.84

I can understand why they want to upsell to Parcel Post. $13+ for essentially the same service.