General Forum

 Mailing one card.   Put the card in a sleeve, put the sleeve in a top loader, put the top loader in a small bank envelope, put that in a firm photo mailer.   Same result as before at the nearest local post office, 2 miles east of me.   I ask for non-machinable rate.   She says "$3.50, there is something hard inside", this as she is bending the envelope.  Genius.   I take the envelope from her.   Go to a post office 5 miles to my west (luckily I was headed there anyway.   Woman clerk says "71 cents".   I paid her and said "thank you".    And they wonder why they are having problems.

do you have self service computer kiosk in your post office?

I use those for domestic letters so I don't have to deal with the policy mis-interpretations of various clerks

mark

I thought from the title this thread was about Canada Post. 

No self service.  Small post office.   I dont print my own either.   Would like some consistencey, that;s all

No self service.  Small post office.   I dont print my own either.   Would like some consistencey, that;s all

I ended up buying those 21-cent stamps for this purpose. But those automated kiosks are really the answer when available.

automated kiosks I use every week

they are down when I need them much too often, like every 6 weeks or so

Like everyone said, I have the postal rates and by my own stamps (especially the 21 centers)..If I had to go to the counter for every trade I make, I'd be fast friends with the post office workers..

To much variance with how they interpret packages and what the shipping rate should be...

I've had the exact same thing happen. One PO says one thing that is too high, another comes in at the correct lower price. Like others have said, I use the kiosks whenever possible. If I can't use a kiosk, I just buy stamps and don't let the PO clerks see what I'm mailing.
I've mailed enough things to know how much they cost.

Desk clerks are apparently bored in the cities and just want to keep the line slow to have something to do all day! I always went to a rural PO and had no problems. It didn't matter who I was dealing with at the desk. They all knew exactly what was going on for US shipments. International gets a bit more complicated, but not too much when you have an experienced clerk. My clerks knew me well. Since I started using Paypal shipping, I don't have to bother with them at all UNLESS my package won't fit in a dropbox. But then it's usually a Priority Mail package. Then it's already printed, labeled and ready to go. They just need to accept it. I do know of a self-service kiosk, but it's far from where I'm generally heading so it wouldn't help me at all.