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New USPS Rant

stettoman said:
And for the record, I just wanted to compare rates between $15+ for flat rate medium boxes and by weight (under 2 lbs) in a Priority box the same size. They've come up with a system I'm sure is designed to get ord'nary joes like me to give up and pay the $15....
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Not only is this a fact it is proven by, asking for a Priority box at your local PO and they say they only stock flat rate. Or if they do stock them they only put FR on display.
 
I'm not looking for anything new right now, but I'm logging this away to look at in the future. By the time I am ready to look at options, maybe there will some other options.
Always something new coming up.


Side note- 15 years ago, the one person in charge was a woman. Had been in the office for 15+years at the time we came here. She got pissed when I referred to her as the Post Mistress as opposed to post Master of our tiny office. :shrug:
 
DWB said:
They got divorced about 5 years ago.
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I had an eBay gift cert and they told me to call PP. Only last year.
 
"eBay spun off PayPal in 2015."
 
Spun off is still the same parent. I had issues and they played ping pong with me. The only real support, believe it or not, that I got was on their Twitter.
 
Actually, a "spin-off" is when a corporation creates a new second corporation via an asset transfer, typically of an operating division, takes stock in exchange for the transfer, and then issues that stock in the new entity to the original corporation's shareholders as a dividend in compensation for the divestiture. It doesn't create a subsidiary, it creates an independent unaffiliated entity, albeit one that may have contractual relationships with the original company.
 
The Hot Pepper said:
I just compared pirate ship USPS to FedEx SmartPost for the same thing and USPS was more.
 
I only suggested Click-N-Ship cuz SL said she way using a 3rd party. Going direct is cheaper.
 
When I use Regional Rate it's only in eBay and they give you a discount.
 
But wise up man! Wise up! :lol:
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i'll check out fedex smartpost, thanks! i'm reading about it now, interesting concept. have you had good reliability with it? also, do you just have a normal fedex account or a biz one?
 
It's a day slower than ground because they pass it off to USPS. I think you just sign up to FedEx and can use it. Some packages can be mad cheap especially if light.
 
Thanks for the tip on the pirate ship. Such a great name. :lol:
 
The Hot Pepper said:
Not only is this a fact it is proven by, asking for a Priority box at your local PO and they say they only stock flat rate. Or if they do stock them they only put FR on display.
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It's been awhile since I ordered them from USPS but if you use a lot of, let's say SFRB, to ship peppers you can order a pkg. of 10 or 25 shipped to your home for free here.
 
sinensis said:
regional and flat rate are consumer/retail products... rise up and seize the savings, comrade
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I just sent out a box, Regional Rate Box B (the rectangular one that is between Medium/Large FR) was $7.xx. FR would have been more than double.
 
I ended up using FedEx tho, was $8.xx but they include $100 insurance, not $50.
 
Now the question remains is that insurance actually going to help? I suspect if your package is lost or destroyed they will make you wish you just paid the $100 and forgot about it before the insurance paid up. Maybe others have better experiences?
 
The_NorthEast_ChileMan said:
It's been awhile since I ordered them from USPS but if you use a lot of, let's say SFRB, to ship peppers you can order a pkg. of 10 or 25 shipped to your home for free here.
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The Hot Pepper said:
I have a whole room full of boxes I ordered lol.
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Haw! Yeah, I'm building a collection too. Maybe I spray them all white and ship them FedEx....
 
Mr.joe said:
Now the question remains is that insurance actually going to help? I suspect if your package is lost or destroyed they will make you wish you just paid the $100 and forgot about it before the insurance paid up. Maybe others have better experiences?
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The insurance was built-in. I didn't pay extra. USPS offers $50 free and FedEx offers $100 free.
 
If it is truly lost and not tracked as delivered you would get it yes. If it tracks as delivered, and they say they never got it (this happens due to errors or theft), they open an investigation. You may get it. Also, if claimed broken.
 
The Hot Pepper said:
I just sent out a box, Regional Rate Box B (the rectangular one that is between Medium/Large FR) was $7.xx. FR would have been more than double.
 
I ended up using FedEx tho, was $8.xx but they include $100 insurance, not $50.
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the package was over 1lb, correct? out of curiosity, was regional actually cheaper than priority cubic commercial rate though? cubic is volumetric pricing instead of weight based, but you can use your own packaging instead of FR box. i was under the impression that cubic is always cheaper than regional boxes. if you have a sec, you can check here without logging in https://www.pirateship.com/rates
 
The Hot Pepper said:
It's a day slower than ground because they pass it off to USPS. I think you just sign up to FedEx and can use it. Some packages can be mad cheap especially if light.
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i must be an idiot. for the life of me, i can't figure out how to get fedex smartpost quotes.
are you sure you don't need to have a special approved biz account/contract with fedex or something to get access to smartpost? i tried my old account and even made a new one as a 'business', but it's not showing me anything about smartpost rates. it's only showing me rates for their normal products like express, 2day, ground, etc (which ofc don't seem to be cheaper than USPS).
 
i'll try calling them tomorrow. maybe they need to manually add it, or maybe it's for higher volume shippers.
 
1. It was over a pound yes. And I'm not sure. It was cheap because it was NY to NY. That's when regional really works. The closer the cheaper.
2. I've only seen SmartPost quotes in eBay because you are using their FedEx account to print the labels. I have not used it outside eBay. Sorry for any confusion, you may need a commercial account for that.
 
Looks about the same actually.
$7.84 parcel $7.94 priority.
4 pounds NY to NY.
 
Regional was 7 something FedEx was 8 something for 6.1" X 9.5" x 12" NY to NY (but Regional you get the free box).
 
Nice find on this site I will check it out further!
 
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