Parcels: Ways to Pay Postage
After choosing to ship with the U.S. Postal Service® for
its quality service and affordability, businesses must select a method of postage
payment that best meets their needs. Postage payment options include: stamp,
postage meter, PC Postage® (Internet postage), and permit imprint.
Stamps, meter strips, and PC Postage are all ‘live’ postage payment methods that
require prepayment. That is, you pay the postage for your shipment when you
buy your
stamps, ‘fill’ your
meter machine, or print
PC Postage. Postage has already
been paid when you print or affix any of these payment options to your package.
As a result, mistakes in package preparation become more costly—when stamps are
lost or stolen, changes need to be made to a shipment after meter strips have been
applied, or a package with PC Postage must be held for shipment another day, you
incur an expense that is hard to recoup.
While stamps, postage meters, or PC Postage may prove sufficient for smaller
postal shippers sending a small number of packages daily, they may prove limiting
to shippers with substantial postal volume.
Permit imprints are advised for mid-
to large-volume shippers—those who ship at least 50 pieces or 200 pounds daily—in
order to avoid the limitations above.
For details on each method, see related articles: “Parcels:
Paying with Stamps”, “Parcels:
Paying with Meters”, “Parcels:
Paying with PC Postage”, and “Parcels:
Paying with Permits."
Window Book’s postal shipping software—Postal
Package Partner™—supports shippers using any of these postage payment
methods by facilitating package preparation and labeling, postal acceptance, postage
management and parcel tracking.