(no subject)

[jack]

What do you do if you want to post a wide flat 101g envelope? According to the royal mail website you can't send it straight first class, it's too heavy. You can't send it large letter first class, it's too wide. And you can't send it first class packet because it's too thin.

What's wrong with that picture? First class packet rates apply if *any* of the four dimensions (length, width, thickness, weight) supernumerarynesses apply.

OK, you can deduce that after considering the page. It's the only way you'd ever design it. But (a) by that argument, they might as well just encrypt everything with a 20-bit key. You can deduce what that says, right? And (b) Sometimes bureaucracies polices do have to be complicated and counter-intuitive, so you can't always just assume it's the way you'd do it.

Why don't they just say what they mean? Then you wouldn't have to guess.

*gasp* *inhale* I also have a lot of objections to the pricing.

I the "ways to pay" section, there's half-a-dozen, including "first class stamps". You used to be able to use *any* stamps adding up to the required postage, nth-class stamps being valued at the current rate. I *assume* you still can. I bet it says somewhere. But I couldn't find it.

Surely more people have two first class stamps than one large letter first class stamp? And don't get me started on the idea of placing the weight boundaries so the prices are all simple multiples of each other!

OK, the site is *fairly* well designed. And ok, to be fair, I ought to know exactly how it works beforehand. And there is a convenient local post-office which I bet would have sold me whatever I needed. But a nice little tutorial on posting a letter wouldn't seem out of place -- someone has to do this for the first time, making it easy for them can only encourage them! :)

Comments

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

I see what you mean. But currently they have 48p/100g 70p/250g 98p/500g 142p/750g. Those fit very roughly into some sort of curve. But if they had 68p/xg 102p/xg 136p/xg they'd only have to adjust those weights to cover an extra 2p-6p worth of postage, and then you could use the stamps you had. You're right, the 48p falls squarely in the middle, you'd need another stamp for that.

After all, the current system already averages out the costs over a range.

In fact, maybe they should just publish a formula of size and weight to calculate cost. If we all have to go and look it up every time *anyway* that wouldn't be any more difficult, and if they're all weighed by computer anyway, no harder for them :)

[bugshaw.livejournal.com]

In the previous structure the prices could often be made from mixing 1st and 2nd class stamps only, hence the occasionally odd-looking numbers. £1.04 (a pound stamp and 2x2p stamps) would be 4x1st-class stamps and save you a trip to the Post Office for the odd values.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes, that's what I was thinking. Apparently I never had occasion to do so whilst I had the opportunity. Although I've no doubt I'd have seen some drawbacks in the odd numbers, but I think on balance I want that option.

[mair_in_grenderich]

I often overstamp rather than queue for exact stamps.

(fsvo often, given I rarely post anything other than little letters)

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I mean, you basically have to considering that you're wasting at most 34p, which is probably way more than the time spent on going to the post office. If you want to avoid wastage, you should pick up some appropriate/combinable stamps to use when it comes up. But considering how rarely it does, it's not worth planning for.

As it happens, I had a book of second class stamps I wanted to get rid of, and three of those cost 2p more than the required large letter first class rate, so assured I could do that, did it, both getting rid of excess stamps, and wasting only 2p (not counting the time spent today talking about it, which is probably about an hour :)).