Australia Post Insufficient postage

[dylan11235813]

This is a picture of a letter sent to a customer (that they took) and had to pay a fee to get the item. The "letter" is under 50g and under 5mm (the compontents contained are 3.5mm accross the longest width) and I passed the item over the counter at the LPO. I measure the width after I package an item and the envolepe is flexible.

I had applied the stamps myself, which I will do more often as it is at least 20% cheaper (sometimes 50% cheaper) to buy stamps on the secondary market.

Does anyone see a problem with this?

[happyinoz]

You say the envelope was under 5mm.  Did the envelope freely pass through the small envelope slot in the letter gauge?  If AP deems a small envelope as not freely fitting through, then they will consider it a large letter.

Having said that, the maths still don't add up in this instance.  Certainly, a mystery.

[chezzy]

Coming from another angle, I am wondering if the contents could move around and bunch up while in transit, this could make the letter bulkier and push it into the "large letter" (more than 5mm) category. There is also a risk of loose or uneven/bulky items causing the letter to jam in the sorting equipment. I tend to think if the items werent held safely in place between cardboard or something that anything could happen!

[jerryman12a]

These stickers are applied by the PO and it wouldn't be unusual for a small franchise one to 'try' it on to see if they can get away with it .

My local PO does this which usually occurs when a AP staff member stands in for the owner ( who is often absent) 

That aside , 70c standard mail should never contain anything else but written material . As a buyer I'd be pretty annoyed to receive items like this as they are easily caught into the sorting machines .

Charge the appropriate rate ($1.40 for you) plus a padded envelope and you won't have any issues .

The amount of times I've had beads/findings sent to me in an letter envelope and 70c stamp and it's been damaged/contents lost etc is beyond a joke.

Sellers know better , anyone sending mail like that are asking for trouble just to save yourself a few cents . And if your return adress was on there you would get the bill , so if you don't put your return address on there IMO your doing it on purpose.

Just my opinion 

[happyinoz]

Like Jerryman, I also wondered about the contents being an issue.  Did some AP staffie feel the envelope and decide it contained something other than printed matter?  Maybe. 

[curraone]

simple really - they decided it had to be a large letter at $3.10 - forgetting that large letters are now $3.50

without a calculator they couldn't add up the 2 stamps to 70c and thought it was 60c paid - decided wouldn't make you pay the fine this time, just the extra postage

= balance owing $2.50 

[bigbrickshop]

Mail sent at the small letter rate has to meet fairly specific requirements for size and flexibility, even the density of the envelope, to avoid damage to the sorting machines.

See section L8.1 of this guide.
http://auspost.com.au/media/documents/letters-products-services-guide-may13.pdf

[chezzy]

I honestly think a lot of people simply don't think, don't care, just want to get that sucker sent and as cheaply as possible.

At the moment I am trying to deal with people who send things like dvds in paper envelopes. For around 'only' 50c extra

they could invest in a cardboard mailer and still send the thing at large letter rates..

[clarry100]

Here's another angle...

The buyer is a scammer.

They have one of these stickers they got from some other seller.

Then they just overlay it onto any envelope they wish, take a pic and send it to you knowing that you will refund them the $2.50. They get a free $2.50 each time they do this to a seller, never having actually paid the fee themselves.

I say this because it simply does not make any sense that the recipient would get the fee when your return adddress was clearly on the envelope.

Not sure what checks you could do at Aust Post to find out if this buyer has really gotten this fee. 

[digital*ghost]

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@clarry100 wrote:

Here's another angle...

The buyer is a scammer.

They have one of these stickers they got from some other seller.

Then they just overlay it onto any envelope they wish, take a pic and send it to you knowing that you will refund them the $2.50. They get a free $2.50 each time they do this to a seller, never having actually paid the fee themselves.

I say this because it simply does not make any sense that the recipient would get the fee when your return adddress was clearly on the envelope.

Not sure what checks you could do at Aust Post to find out if this buyer has really gotten this fee. 

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I thought of that possibility primarily because the figure doesn't make sense (not unless the processing fee has increased to $1.80). Not sure what records AP would keep, but OP may be able to ask for the name of the PO where they picked up / paid for the letter. 

Re: a couple of other things that have been mentioned - unfortunately, there have been instances in the past where AP have charged the buyer the underpaid mail fee even when the sender's address is on the envelope, so while the standard procedure is usually to charge the sender, it doesn't always happen that way.

A small letter does not only have to contain printed material, as the guide posted above will show, there is in fact no stipulation in any of AP's letter restrictions (large or small) about printed material, only some services where you can only send documents, and a CD is considered a document, which is quite rigid - the contents of small letters have to be (to quote the guide) "reasonably flexible", so something like a hankerchief would be fine (the contents of this do look rigid to me, so if that's the case they should have gone as a large letter). 

[gec2002]

Bit hard to tell from the photo, but the other odd thing is the stamps don't appear to have been cancelled??