stamps

In a last-ditch effort to save itself from bankruptcy, the Postal Service is forging ahead with plans to close half of its 500 mail processing centers and roughly 3,700 of its post offices. The result: Deliveries will take longer.

Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe has announced his latest initiative to save the post office from bankruptcy. (Hint: Improving customer service isn't a part of it.) His master plan: Hike the cost of mailing a letter for real people, and cut prices for junk mail.

It'll cost a penny more to mail a letter next year. The cash-strapped U.S. Postal Service announced Tuesday that it will increase postage rates on Jan. 22, including a one-cent increase in the cost of first-class mail, to 45 cents.

The U.S. Postal Service released a list of nearly 3,700 post offices that it will consider shuttering. The USPS lost more than $2.2 billion last quarter, and has warned that it will run out of money in September, so such closures are probably inevitable.

The U.S. Postal Service warned that it will miss federal payments totaling an estimated $6.8 billion by October, unless the government steps in.

The U.S. Postal Service announced plans to hike postage rates on several different types of mail in April, but the cost of sending Mother's Day cards in May will stay the same. The postal service said the cost of a stamp for a basic letter will remain 44 cents, but the price to send larger...

The U.S. Postal Service's attempt to raise the price of a first-class stamp to 46 cents from 44 cents was unanimously rejected today by an oversight board, which said the Postal Service failed to sufficiently quantify either the effect of the recession on operations or how much mail shipments would decline if rates were increased.

It looks like there is one price hike that consumers may yet get to avoid next year. The U.S. Postal Service's plans to raise prices on stamps to 46 cents from 44 cents in January -- a 4.5% increase -- could be in doubt. In an unprecedented move today, a coalition of 700 mailers acting as the...

The U.S. Postal Service is having all sorts of financial problems lately, and it's likely to affect consumers' pocketbooks as well as their mail service. After losing $2.8 billion last year and with larger losses expected this year, the Postal Service is offering early retirement to 150,000 workers...

It's always boggled my mind how some people will pay thousands of dollars for items that once sold for just pennies. It would be neat to see a 200-year-old rare coin, or a collection of commemorative stamps from the early 20th century, but I just don't see spending the equivalent of a vacation...