U.S. To Raise Letter Mail Rate 2¢ In July

[press release] [click on any of the pictures for larger versions]
U.S. Postal Service Announces New Prices for 2022
Two Cents Increase for Forever Stamp

WASHINGTON, DC — Today the United States Postal Service filed notice with the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC) of price changes to take effect July 10, 2022. The new prices, if favorably reviewed, include a two-cent increase in the price of a First-Class Mail Forever stamp from 58 cents to 60 cents.

The proposed prices, approved by the Governors of the U.S. Postal Service, would raise First-Class Mail prices approximately 6.5 percent which is lower than the Bureau of Labor Statistics annual inflation rate of 7.9 percent as of the end of February. The price changes reflect a judicious implementation of the Postal Service’s pricing authority provided by the Postal Regulatory Commission.

If favorably reviewed by the PRC, the single-piece letter additional ounce price would increase to 24 cents, the metered mail 1-ounce price would increase to 57 cents and the price of a postcard stamp would increase to 44 cents. A one-ounce letter mailed to other countries would increase to $1.40 cents. The Postal Service is also seeking price adjustments for Special Services products including Certified Mail, Post Office Box rental fees, Money Order fees and the cost to purchase insurance when mailing an item.

The proposed Mailing Services price changes include:

Product
Letters (1 oz.)
Letters (metered 1 oz.)
Letters additional ounce(s)
Domestic Postcards
International Letter (1 oz.)
Current Prices
58¢
53¢
20¢
40¢
$1.30
Planned Prices
60¢
57¢
24¢
44¢
$1.40

As inflation and increased operating expenses continue, these price adjustments will help with the implementation of the Delivering for America plan, including a $40 billion investment in core Postal Service infrastructure over the next ten years. With the new prices, the Postal Service will continue to provide the lowest letter-mail postage rates in the industrialized world and offer a great value in shipping.

The PRC will review the prices before they are scheduled to take effect. The complete Postal Service price filing with prices for all products can be found on the PRC site under the Daily Listings section at prc.gov/dockets/daily. The Mailing Services filing is Docket No. R2022-1. The price change tables are also available on the Postal Service’s Postal Explorer website at pe.usps.com/PriceChange/Index.

The Postal Service generally receives no tax dollars for operating expenses and relies on the sale of postage, products, and services to fund its operations.

9 thoughts on “U.S. To Raise Letter Mail Rate 2¢ In July

    • PRC Approved Increase on 27 MAY 2022 – Effective 10 July 2022. Hallmark Cards will cost 99 cents. ( 60c + 39c Non-Machinable Surcharge )

      • Lefty, I can’t find any website that lists that the PRC approved the increase. Can you put a link?

        • I can never make sense of the PRC.gov site, but on Facebook, Lefty posted a link to the story in the Postal Times That story links to the Order. No. 6188, and from that page you can choose to open the text in either .pdf or .docx (Word) formats.

        • BTW, on the .pdf version, you can “cut to the chase” by scrolling down to page 114. 🙂

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