# USPS postage rate hiked today **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 28, 2013, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570 "2013-01-28T00:41:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Ignatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/3be4f8/32.png) [@Ignatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ignatz)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/1 "2013-01-28T00:41:22Z")
I mailed my rent check this a.m. in the drop box at the P.O. with 45 cents postage. So this evening on the network tv news I see that the first class rate rose to 46 cents today. Why no pre-hike publicity? Will they send it thru without returning it for insufficient postage, like they have done for a couple of grace days after previous hikes? ---
**Author:** ![zombywoof](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/9e8a1a/32.png) [@zombywoof](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zombywoof)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/2 "2013-01-28T00:46:00Z")
Haven’t most all US stamps been non-denominated (good for First Class Mail “Forever”) for like 5+ years now? ---
**Author:** ![johnpost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f17d59/32.png) [@johnpost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/johnpost)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/3 "2013-01-28T00:49:59Z")
it was announced months ago. i believe anything deposited in the box today will allow the old rate. ---
**Author:** ![Ignatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/3be4f8/32.png) [@Ignatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ignatz)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/4 "2013-01-28T00:55:45Z")
> [@zombywoof](#): > > Haven’t most all US stamps been non-denominated (good for First Class Mail “Forever”) for like 5+ years now? I have a cache of pre-Forever denominations. I used two 21-cent & three -1cent lick-em-and-stick-em stamps. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/5 "2013-01-28T01:21:03Z")
> [@Ignatz](#): > > Why no pre-hike publicity? Good question. I hadn’t heard about it either (or if I did, it was so long ago that I forgot). ---
**Author:** ![BwanaBob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bwanabob/32/2985_2.png) [@BwanaBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BwanaBob)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/6 "2013-01-28T01:25:17Z")
> [@Ignatz](#): > > I mailed my rent check this a.m. in the drop box at the P.O. with 45 cents postage. So this evening on the network tv news I see that the first class rate rose to 46 cents today. > > Why no pre-hike publicity? > > Will they send it thru without returning it for insufficient postage, like they have done for a couple of grace days after previous hikes? Your post office should have had a notice posted. I’ve been to three different ones recently and they all had it posted. ---
**Author:** ![Duckster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/duckster/32/1244_2.png) [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/7 "2013-01-28T01:34:40Z")
[U.S. Postal Service Announces New Prices and Services for 2013](https://about.usps.com/news/national-releases/2012/pr12_114.htm) - Press release issued 11 October 2012. ---
**Author:** ![dracoi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/90db22/32.png) [@dracoi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dracoi)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/8 "2013-01-28T01:46:45Z")
I would expect that the post office will give you a little grace about the 1 cent different for at least a few days. Sometimes they’ll try to collect the difference from the recipient. The rate change was announced quite some time ago, but I haven’t seen the same amount of media coverage about it that I’ve seen in the past. (Maybe they’ve decided that talking about some football player’s imaginary girlfriend is more relevant to our daily lives than the price of postage… but I suppose that’s better suited for the pit.) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/9 "2013-01-28T01:50:12Z")
Huh, that’s funny. Just today, I was dropping my rent check in the mail, and thinking to myself “I wonder what the current rate is? I might be able to scrounge up some old stamps to equal it”. Though as it happens, the stamp I chose was a Forever, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Silophant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a698b9/32.png) [@Silophant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silophant)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/10 "2013-01-28T02:53:34Z")
I got a letter from my mom a couple weeks ago, and noticed that she had accidentally sent it with a 32-cent stamp that she apparently had found in the back of a drawer somewhere. So, apparently, the post office doesn’t always bother to check. ---
**Author:** ![lazybratsche](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ba8739/32.png) [@lazybratsche](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lazybratsche)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/11 "2013-01-28T03:06:48Z")
> [@zombywoof](#): > > Haven’t most all US stamps been non-denominated (good for First Class Mail “Forever”) for like 5+ years now? Not entirely. I have a stockpile of 44 cent stamps leftover from wedding invites/responses/thankyoucards/etc. I’ve been using them with penny stamps for a while, and now I’ll have to get two cent stamps. Of course, there were forever stamps available at the time and for many years prior, but those didn’t match the invitations :smack:. At my current snail-mail rate, it’ll take me 20 years to use all these damn stamps… ---
**Author:** ![SpoilerVirgin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4491bb/32.png) [@SpoilerVirgin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpoilerVirgin)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2013, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usps-postage-rate-hiked-today/648570/12 "2013-01-28T03:53:01Z")
I knew about the increase, but I didn’t know the day and for some reason I thought the new price was 47 cents. So I’ve sent a few letters over the past few weeks with my 44 cent Colbert stamps plus 3 one cent stamps. I guess that was a good 3 or 4 cents wasted.