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Messages: U.S. Postage
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media mail timing
I recently sent a book overseas - it got there in two days. At the same time, I sent a book to a town that is only 30 minutes away - it took 32 days to get there. Who knew that snail mail uses real snails!
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Darth Heather
12 years ago
3 comments
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AVOIDING GOING TO THE POST OFFICE
Hi everybody - I've been on BookMooch for some time and, as I get older and more reluctant to keep going to the post office (especially in the Minnesota winter) and USPS gets more restrictive about what they will accept as mail with stamps on it (currently the envelope has to weigh less than 10 oz and be less than 1/2 inch thick), I found myself listing fewer and fewer books. Then on a LibraryThing forum I found a site called "Pirate Ship". On this site you can enter the sender and destination name and address and the type of postage you want (you can specify Media Mail), the site will generate a USPS mailing label with a tracking number that you can print and put on the envelope, and the charge is the same as if you took it to the Post Office (no monthly fees, no per-label charge). I thought it was too good to be true so I tried it a few times and it has always worked. My mail carrier is willing to pick up the envelopes/packages, I can follow with the tracking number on the USPS website, and I can send multiple books and books that don't meet the qualifications for mail with stamps. If you want to avoid the trip to the post office, I recommend that you try it--I'm sure you'll like it as much as I do.
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Miriam
3 years ago
4 comments
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| (2 years ago) | Marcus - I don't know what the answer is to the international postage problem. Once upon a time there was an international book rate, and I used to send books overseas from the U.S. routinely. First the international book rate disappeared, and then the package rates started going up. I recently discovered that the Pirate Ship site, which I've referenced previously and which I now use for sending all books (no Post Office runs!) has an international shipping program which looks cheaper than the regular U.S. Post Office rates and might still be within reasonable limits (considering 3 points for an international mooch), even though I would often have to ask people to mooch 2 books to make it work. I believe people have asked that the BookMooch points for an international mooch be raised and nothing has happened. As to the forums, I think there may be less interest in book-swapping in general since Amazon has provided a way to get money for used books and also to reach a much wider customer base. BookMooch is also suffering from the inability to access Amazon US to list books.
- Miriam | | (2 years ago) | Today is digital detox day - delete redundant websites, mailing lists and remove bookmooch fora that you do not use. THIS forum seems quite active, but it touches a reason why many of us are not mooching so much.
The cost of postage has gone up and media mail has been quite restrictive.
How can we find and make alternatives to get us mooching again? Partly this is only USA focused, and I am not in the USA. But some is also an international aspect. There are many books I would mooch from the USA - but I cannot as the holder won't mooch outside their country - and several have said they will send but balked when they see the postal costs!!!
ARE there some alteratives? How can we be more creative to get the books circulating? RIght now in a pandemic we are not flying so much - but outside of that is there a way the those that do travel internatiionally might act rather like the Angels did and take books abroad and post them? How might that work - points donations? Some kind of BookMooch bonus?
Are there some ways we can take advantage of those in forces bases around the world that can send internationally at domestic rates? Or community library rates?
Is there a way we can bulk send via slower shipping?
I do not know but any thoughts are good!
- marcus petz | | (3 years ago) | Cherry - it's really quite simple. You go to the PirateShip site and open an account. You have to load some money onto it using a credit card. Then every time you need to mail a book, you fill out the form, telling it the package qualifies for Media Mail, and it gives you a standard Post Office package label to print out and deducts the amount from what you have loaded on your account. You can specify a mailing date, and I gather the Post Office doesn't like it to be more than 4 or 5 days later than when you print the label. The site has some good informative explanations and their Chat is very helpful. I just leave the packages for my mailwoman to pick up along with my other outgoing mail, but you might have to negotiate that with your carrier. Take a look at the PirateShip site.
- Miriam | | (3 years ago) | Arlene - Then try Pirate Ship, and I hope you like it as much as I do. - Miriam
- Miriam |
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USPS Media Mail service to be discontinued?
I went to the post office today to send a mooched book. To send it first class it would've cost $2.90, so I asked to send it via Media Mail which cost $2.41. The worker rung it up incorrectly and when I pointed it out, he corrected it but without giving me a lecture about how they will soon be getting rid of Media Mail. "Everything's going to be First Class now. I don't know when, but it's all going to First Class and everyone's going to have to pay higher rates." I don't know if he was annoyed that I had pointed out his mistake or that I wanted to go the cheaper route but he also lectured me that I shouldn't have written a return address if I was going to send it via Media Mail and on and on about the disadvantages of Media Mail. Anyone else heard that the Media Mail option will soon be discontinued?
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Susan
12 years ago
4 comments
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| (9 years ago) | Heard just a couple of weeks ago the rumor again that media mail may be discontinued as recent as January when the next postal rate hike is supposed to take place. Any idea if it is more likely to happen this time around?
- Jill | | (12 years ago) | As a postal employee, I have not heard about discontinuing Media Mail. We are told not to offer Media rate but the customer can request it. An act of congress started Media Mail so that people could afford to send books (educational items) at an affordable rate. Any changes to Postal policy or rates has to be voted on by Congress.
A return address is required otherwise it is considered suspicious. Mail that does not have a return address and is not deliverable is sent to/disposed of by the Mail recovery unit.
Media mail and parcel post classes are only returned or forwarded for a fee. If your package is returned or forwarded on,the mailer or the recipient has to pay the postage fee again. So, sometimes it is not the best value. That class of mail postage only covers one trip.
Postal policy is packages are kept 10 days. first day notice, second notice 5 days later with return date posted. Except for POBox addresses, they are kept until box is closed. If customer doesn't pick up package it is returned postage due to mailer.
- Helen | | (12 years ago) | Lordy, ignorant postal clerks are the worst. Don't get me wrong, some are lovely, but there seem to be many that just make stuff up as they go. I have heard all kinds of "theories" from USPS clerks that have later been flatly rejected by people who work for the postal service but actually know what's going on. I've never heard the "don't put on a return address" nonsense; in fact, I've had a clerk take me to task when I didn't put down my name as well as my street address as a return address.
I know that the USPS has had problems with people using media mail for things that aren't media - like ebay auctions for clothes, say - and so have stepped up inspections. I'm sure they are losing a certain amount of money with people who do that, because the cost savings for heavy items is significant.
There definitely seems to be a push to priority mail services and flat-rate choices; on the USPS site when you look up the cost of postage, rates that are lower than priority aren't even visible unless you click some hard-to-find button. And I've never had a clerk suggest media mail to me - they have to go through the usual spiel about priority and faster-than-priority choices as a rule, I would guess.
When you think about it, there's no particular reason why media mail (i.e. book rate) exists for us average folks; there's already a library rate that libraries and schools can use if they want. Why can books be sent so much cheaper than anything else? I wouldn't be surprised if the USPS would like to eliminate media mail, but I haven't heard any specific plans for it. I will say that if they eliminate media mail, I will understand but I will have to stop book swapping - it'd just be too expensive. It'd be like when the USPS got rid of international surface mail and so many of the US Bookmoochers stopped mailing overseas entirely.
- LauraTS | | (12 years ago) | I doubt it will be discontinued any time soon, since the rates just went up yesterday and Media Mail is included in the rate increases. It also includes delivery confirmation now when you use printable postage, which is nice. As for the part about no return address, that is just stupid. Media mail is not usually forwarded outside of the local area, so if the person you mailed the book to had moved and not updated their address on BM, the book would probably be returned to you. You would be charged for return service, so he may have been trying to avoid them returning the book to you? I'd rather know what happened to the book than have it just disappear. His comments were inappropriate partly because it doesn't matter at all if MM goes away at some unknown date in the future, you asked for it that day when it was still in effect.
I would be interested to know if the USPS is "losing" money on Media mail and other parcel services and if they are if it at a higher rate than First Class. Also, I found the Wikipedia article about the crisis interesting.
- Sarah |
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Lost book from Portugal
I just received in the mail a returned book that apparently is because the sender used a recycled package of mine that I must have used to send a book to them. It doesn't have a return address for the sender, but mine instead. I can't read the reason for the return because it is either in French or Portuguese. But I do have the recipient's address, which of course doesn't match up with any username here on the site. So, is anyone waiting on the book:  P. N. Elrod : My Big Fat Supernatural Wedding
Is there any other way to try and find the recipient or sender? Not sure what to do from here. Thanks for any help!
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cocoGerman
9 years ago
4 comments
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| (9 years ago) | Melanie, you are awesome! I believe you are correct. Going to email Schwan now. Thanks!
- cocoGerman | | (9 years ago) | It's the other way around, the oldest mooches are at the top and the newest at the bottom of the list ( I double checked by looking at the last book I sent).
- kathers | | (9 years ago) | Thanks, I will try that.
- cocoGerman | | (9 years ago) | Look at the book page, at the recent moochers & givers. Possibly the giver from Canada is your sender (French is used there). I'm pretty sure that's in date order, the first giver/moocher you see is the most recent.
- Michael |
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Used envelopes
Hi to anyone who's reading this! I work at a community college as a cleaner, and I often find used envelopes in the trash (the nice yellowy-orange ones with bubble-wrap padding on the inside, or without padding, or priority mail ones). As a result of my environmental angst/hoarder tendencies I've been collecting them and bringing them home for the past few days. First I thought, "Great, now I have envelopes for shipping books!" but even now I have enough to last me for probably the rest of the year (I don't really ship that much of anything). So I've been trying to scheme up a way to give them to other people so they can use them (granted they don't mind re-using packaging that's already been written on, whited out, had stickers on and tore off, cut open and torn up -- but still perfectly usable). There's no one in my life that could use a bunch of envelopes, but surely people from here could. Other than sticking an extra one in when a book is mooched, however, I can't think of what to do with them. I don't want to pay to ship just envelopes! It seems a little counter-productive. Does anyone have any ideas? Or is this just a silly idea to begin with?
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Chey
12 years ago
5 comments
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| (12 years ago) | Sorry for the late reply! Thank you everyone! I'll probably put some on here, then... I didn't even think to search 'envelopes'. And it's also good to know about that freecycle thing, that's really cool.
Once I went to mail something in a box that had priority mail tape all over it, and the guy at the post office let me ship it at a different rate after I taped over the priority mail tape with brown tape (which is still see-through...). So I don't see why they wouldn't let you re-use them if you sharpie'd over their markings or turned them inside-out. But I only have that one experience. (I only have one or two of those envelopes anyways, which I can just use for bookbinding.)
- Chey | | (12 years ago) | Note that if you're in the US, priority mail material cannot be used (or reused, even turned inside-out and the like) to send at any other rate, including media mail rate which is probably what most people use.
- Aude | | (12 years ago) | I would love a box full with usable envelopes... I know what you wrote... If you don't mind shipping me a box load of envelopes... that would be nice...
Eddie
- thebigbangtheory | | (12 years ago) | If you have a freecycle group and email list in your area, there may be someone who's interested in the mailers and will take them off your hands. I've gotten rid of all kinds of stuff, some of it quite odd, on freecyle. (You can search for a local group on freecycle.org.)
- LauraTS | | (12 years ago) | Would you be willing to pay to ship them if you got a credit in return? If you search for "envelopes" there are several listings for bundles of a half dozen Manilla, Padded and Cardboard.
- Sarah |
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