Thursday, October 30, 2008

Puzzling through Certified Mail

So I need to send that letter with some sort of delivery confirmation to that collection agency. I'm forever confused by the post office options so I thought I'd take this oppertunity to learn it as I really need to do this with Health Net next year anyway.

I thought you could just send something "Return Receipt" but it turns out with much looking at http://pe.usps.com/text/dmm100/adding.htm that Return Receipt is only an extra service of Certified Mail and there's an extra charge on top of the $2.70 that Certified Mail costs (yikes). Fortunately, my work has the Certified Mail stickers and there was someone at work who could help me affix the label properly and retain the number on the receipt that I am supposed to keep (I was just about to give up and go to the post office.) There are instructions on the label and I had figured out some of it, but there is a place on the receipt for a postmark that apparently is not necessary since the tracking number is on there.

So the steps are:
Weigh the item
Calculate the 1st class postage (http://www.usps.com can help with this)
Add $2.70 for the Certified Mail
Affix the postage using a postal machine or your PCs printer (I wouldn't bother with stamps)
Get a Certified Mail Receipt form (either your work or the post office will have these.)
Fill out the form on the right hand side of the form (this is your receipt so it is optional)
The important part
Detach the left hand side of the form fold on the dotted line and attach it to the top of the envelope on the right hand side of the return address. The fold will be along the top of the envelope. Most of the label including the bar code will be showing on the front. Oh and peel off one of the numbers and attach it to your receipt - though I notice that number is already on this receipt so that's optional too. (Could attach it to something else I guess.) I'd have a picture but it already has been picked up.

[quote from http://pe.usps.com/text/dmm100/preparing.htm]
Extra Services
Place labels for extra services above the delivery address and to the right of the return address, or to the left of the delivery address.

Here are some screen shots of my initial investigation to see if I could just get return receipt with out certified mail - nope.


1 comment:

Unknown said...

The Post Office has a thing called "Delivery Confirmation" that lets you have a return receipt without using Certified Mail. I used to use that for tax returns until I decided to just trust the USPS and IRS.