Australia Post price increase - period of grace?

[cathyjoyjoy]

Is anyone aware if there is a "period of grace" after 4 January, where the old letter rates will be accepted without the recipient being charged for underpaid postage?  In the past there has been an "unwritten period of grace", sometimes two weeks or a month.

This is the case where you drop a pre-stamped letter into a red post box.  Of course once you approached the post office counter, the latest postage would be charged.

Happy New Year and thank you for all the very helpful "inside advice".

[chameleon54]

For heavens sake, Just pay the correct postage postage people.

Yes I know it hurts. Yes I know we all feel we are being ripped off by Australia Post. But these are the new postage costs and we have to live with them. If your business cant support the price increases, you need to find a more viable product or business model, or find something else to do with your time.

If people underpay on the postage and the buyer is asked to stump up the extra, the defects will come rolling in quicker than Lance Armstong on ice. With the "new improved" slow delivery service and ebay not updating their delivery time estimates, this will be a big enough problem as it is.

[*tippy*toes*]

I'm certainly not going to risk upsetting buyers by them getting an underpaid notice to try and save a few cents for the next 2 weeks. How often do we see sellers getting negative feedback because the seller underpaid the postage and the buyer had to cough up the difference (plus the fine) to get their item? I know I've seen a few of them. When I see a string of them it makes me think twice about buying from that seller.

My items that go large letter are low cost, so even if the underpaid notice came to me, it would eat any profits I made on that item.

Theforcemedia mentioned that he felt sorry for the old lady down the street who probably doesn't know about the increase. Old people tend to watch the news and read the paper. Old people would be more aware than a lot of the younger folk that never watch the news or read the paper. Old people tend to stay up to date with current news. I would imagine at some point this increase would have been in the paper or on the TV news.

To the ones that think underpaying is a good idea because one person said it in a forum, if someone came into your shop and demanded a discount because that item was on sale 3 months ago, would you honour it? I thought so.

[joethenuts]

let me say something  were do you think the 2 weeks grace came from , were do you think the staff member got it from , 

this post is about period of grace is it not , some say 1 week  some say 10 days  some say 2weeks  some say no grace   some say from the 5th jan ,   what i agree on is my business , i am not telling people to pay 70cents until 2 weeks,  i just agree with this poster and its not the only time i have heard of it being 2 weeks.   i am not sending parcels in an envelope , in fact i might not even send a letter in the next 2 weeks. 

ps  if an employee  of mine stated yes its free delivery , which means he would of got that info from his boss me.

[joethenuts]

the op is asking the question what is the period of grace   not should i pay new price straight away or not will it give me a defect. in fact nothing is mentioned about large letter parcels  or ebay. [period of grace]  nothing to do with is it cheating or defects or whatever.

even a main poster says 7 to 10 days is the usual, so why not target that poster  , instead of the new guy who posted yesteday , who got the info from the horses mouth with a name ..

[*tippy*toes*]

The period of grace is for letters that are already in the system. NOT new letters posted after Monday. As you should know, letters don't magically arrive an hour after they are posted. Some can take a week or 2 to arrive. Therefore, they need to allow for the mail that was posted before Monday to arrive. Anything posted after Monday is subject to the new rates because it was not already in the system. The mail centre will know that it was posted after Monday. It hadn't been posted on Sunday afternoon. I'm not sure why that is so hard for you to understand.

I also don't understand why you feel the other message makes it any more truthful because the member gave a name of the employee who told them. My postmaster that I asked has a name too, but it's irrelevant to this discussion what his name is. Would it make my message any more believable if I dropped his name? I am going to believe the word of the postmaster, the one who runs the show, rather than just someone who works behind the counter who has a name on a forum (how do you know that is actually her name?).

I really don't know why I bother. I'd get more sense out of the toddler next door.

[joethenuts]

do i believe the 2 week man   do i believe you   do i believe a regular poster  all 3 diferent answeres   .

so everybody who have posted here are wrong except you.   well next time i will consider that, dorothy.

have a nice day at home or at work.

oh if that is your real name.   

[lyndal1838]

Joe, instead of calling me a regular poster I give you permission to use my ID when stating that I have posted that the period of grace is 7-10 days.   Not only has it always been that way during the 50 odd years that I have been dealing with business mail but while this thread was active I made a phone call to the post mistress at one of the major post offices in the Sydney CBD and she has confirmed that this is correct.

As I said before....if we keep arguing long enough there is sure to be a poster who will receive an underpaid item fine and they can let us know when it was posted.   Would that settle the question for you?

[joethenuts]

can you explain what period of grace means  thank you

[padi*0409]

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@joethenuts wrote:

can you explain what period of grace means  thank you

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grace_period

Google will be your friend, if you let it.

[collect247]

It's when you sit down at the dinner table and say grace period.