USPS Priority Price Increase?

[riverat]

Has the Ebay discount rate for USPS priority mail increased in the last 3-4 days? Priority small flat rate boxes were $8.41 as of Friday, today its showing up as $9.55. I have not heard there was a price increase. Anyone else seeing this or know about it?

[1786davycrockett]

@riverat 

It was announced on eBay a few weeks ago that USPS would be "temporarily" raising prices on Priority and Ground Advantage shipments.

Here's the USPS official memo --

https://about.usps.com/newsroom/national-releases/2024/0905-usps-proposes-temporary-rate-changes-for...

[lakefor94]

USPS also had a rate increase for a vast amount of particular zip codes that are considered off the beaten path, so to speak.

[nobody*s_perfect]

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@riverat wrote:

Has the Ebay discount rate for USPS priority mail increased in the last 3-4 days? Priority small flat rate boxes were $8.41 as of Friday, today its showing up as $9.55....

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You seem to have encountered both of the recent USPS rate changes: (1) holiday surcharge of 50 cents for the small flat rate box; and (2) September 16 policy change which affects 17,000 out of 42,000 ZIP Codes. For those ZIP Codes, the price for your eBay postage labels will be the regular published online (Commercial) rate, not the lower eBay rate.  The published Commercial price for a small flat rate box is $9.05.

eBay awkward Announcement about the 9/16 change affecting selected ZIP Codes:

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Announcements/USPS-Rate-Changes-Effective-September-16-2024/ba-p/34661...

[riverat]

So the cost of the Flat Rate Small box went up for some zip codes?  What happened to the "one rate, any weight, any destination"?

But they tell us inflation is not a problem.

[nobody*s_perfect]

It's not so flat any more, but of course the price is not affected by weight or by distance in the usual sense..   

[jg.mason]

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@riverat wrote:

So the cost of the Flat Rate Small box went up for some zip codes?  What happened to the "one rate, any weight, any destination"?

But they tell us inflation is not a problem.

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USPS didn't really raise the cost, they just lessened eBays discount.

I agree with nobody*s_perfect that was an awkward announcement by eBay. The announcement made it seem like it was a USPS rate increase to those zip codes (which I guess it technically was) when it actually was USPS reducing eBays discount to those zip codes.

[richard1rst]

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@riverat wrote:

So the cost of the Flat Rate Small box went up for some zip codes?  What happened to the "one rate, any weight, any destination"?

But they tell us inflation is not a problem.

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I would guess that the quote you offer refers to the published retail rate, which unless you are doing it wrong, nobody here pays retail. Now, the discounts we get may vary based on different criteria but that does not negate the validity of the "one rate" advertisement as it relates to the retail price.