Post Office Proposes Special Rate For Mailing DVDs 176
An anonymous reader writes "The United States Postal Service is seeking to implement a special postage rate for companies such as Netflix, GameFly and Blockbuster (PDF), which send DVDs to their customers and then receive them back. This proposal for special rates for two-way mailers of optical disks follows a protracted legal complaint from GameFly, which argued that Netflix was receiving special handling by the Postal Service while paying a cheaper postage rate."
How is this news? (Score:2)
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Re:How is this news? (Score:5, Informative)
I have to wonder if this law getting passed couldn't be traced back to Fed Ex and UPS wanting the business that USPS was doing so found a way to stick them with a bill that they could never pay while remaining able to compete.
USPS is also not allowed to raise prices beyond some (official/fudged) price index increase.
It lets them tie a boat anchor to USPS so that USPS ends up in a bind and either has to cut service or raise prices, both of which benefits UPS and Fed Ex.
UPS/FedEx constantly use USPS on "unprofitable" routes, because USPS is also required to keep prices relatively constant. So if the package is going to the middle of nowhere, UPS and FedEx will gladly outsource it to USPS which will deliver it at a loss. USPS cannot actually raise prices, but if they cut services, that may actually harm their competitors.
Re:How is this news? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:How is this news? (Score:4, Informative)
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The only perk is that you get Saturday delivery (for now).
A much greater factor is that the USPS has a key to your mailbox and possible front gate, and will leave mail for you regardless of whether you're home or not.
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Even if private companies COULD manage to maintain a profit while serving podunk towns and the red sticks, why the hell would they? Why make a $1 in the city and lose $0.50 in the sticks to net $0.50 when they can just make $1 in the city?
Of course they won't, unless the government subsidizes the delivery. Which is no different from what it does now, except 1) it's free to contract with anyone based on an open bidding process, 2) expenses are accounted for as they're accrued. In other words, it will become clear exactly how much it costs to deliver mail to Podunk. Government can then make a proper cost-benefit calculation and determine if it's worth delivery once a week, twice a week, once or day, or on weekends. There's no point having
Re:How is this news? (Score:5, Informative)
Because unlike every other business on the planet Dubya passed a law that says the USPS has to have the ENTIRE retirement plan, to the very last penny for every single employee, funded for something like 40 years?
It's worse than that. The law gives the USPS 10 years to come up with 100% of the money needed to fund all of its pension requirements for the next 75 years.
It's designed to destroy the USPS so Republican lawmakers can bemoan how government has once again failed to deliver. Except that they're the ones who have failed us.
Re: How is this news? (Score:2)
Yeah, how dare they fully fund the pensions, when they should be funding them like Detroit funded their worker pensions. Oh, wait...
I'm not saying the republicans may not be putting the USPS in a bad spot. But is is really rare for pension funds to be adequately funded and most of those stories end up with the workers promised the pentions being royally screwed..
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But this is like telling you: "Since a lot of parents fail to account for the true cost of raising their future children, you have ten years to come up with every penny you'll spend for the first 18 years of their lives, their college tuition and their retirement. Anyway, congratulations on graduating high school!"
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The timeline was aggressive and they didn't allow for additional revenue. But let's say that and not pretend that the Post Office wasn't running a scam before. At the very least, those unfunded pensions should have been showing up on the balance sheet like the liabilities that they really were.
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But is is really rare for pension funds to be adequately funded and most of those stories end up with the workers promised the pentions being royally screwed..
We've heard the narrative before. When someone gets fucked out of their pensions because it wasnt fully funded, the Democrats blame the Republicans.
When the USPS is forced to fully fund its pension, the Democrats blame the Republicans.
See how this works?
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The company needs to pay $X in 75 years. To meet that obligation, the law (TLDR, assumed from parent) says that $X is needed in the bank today.
Well looking at me as a private citizen, if I plan on retiring in 75 years and put $Y in the bank today with an interest rate of dick% it will still be $Y by then. (And of course purchasing power will halve).
So... what's the problem?
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It's worse than that. The law gives the USPS 10 years to come up with 100% of the money needed to fund all of its pension requirements for the next 75 years.
It's designed to destroy the USPS so Republican lawmakers can bemoan how government has once again failed to deliver. Except that they're the ones who have failed us.
Oh, it's even worse than that. When a veteran from the military gets employment at the USPS, now instead of the military budget being responsible for his/her retirement, the USPS is now responsible for it. Even for the years they were in the military! (Does any money already put in for that person by the military to any funds transfer to the USPS? Of course not, silly.)
This of course makes the military budgets look better, and the USPS budgets look worse. And veterans are given hiring preference by the US
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> Every business should be required to actually fund their pension plans
I'll do you one better: employer pension plans should be outlawed. You want a pension plan? It has to be managed by a outside entity, and the employer is never allowed to touch the money once it goes in.
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It has to be managed by a outside entity, and the employer is never allowed to touch the money once it goes in.
I'm confused - how does that help me make promises to an employee that I never intend to keep, while relying on taxpayers to cover my compensation costs?
Re:How is this news? (Score:5, Insightful)
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My understanding is that the 75 years number is, in typical politician style, misleading. Congress is making the Post Office fully fund current retiree pensions as well as current employee pensions. Add those numbers together and you get the equivalent of funding pensions out 75 years - but that's not the way the law is phrased.
There's nothing wrong with funding the pensions (in fact it's the only moral choice), but I do fault the congress for not approving a rate increase or for not letting them stretch ou
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Every business should be required to actually fund their pension plans instead of whining to the government for bailouts later. See countless examples of companies going bankrupt over union demands and the unions whining about their pensions they're "owed"
By forcing the USPS to actually be accountable for it's promises to the unions, they can deal with the problem now rather than later.
I have absolutely zero problem with forcing institutions to pre-fund their pension plans.
But Congress gave the USPS entirely unreasonable demands in an entirely unreasonable timeframe. Even 40 or 50 years in 10 would be far too much.
But all of this is beside the point and not the real issue here, as the whole purpose of the stipulation is to trigger the financial collapse of the USPS.
Re:How is this news? (Score:5, Insightful)
Okay, here's the deal. You have until your 30th birthday to fully fund a retirement account that must last until you turn 95. If you can't, you must declare bankruptcy and lose everything. Sound fair?
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Okay, here's the deal. You have until your 30th birthday to fully fund a retirement account that must last until you turn 95. If you can't, you must declare bankruptcy and lose everything. Sound fair?
That's not the problem USPS is facing. The problem they're facing is that when you turn 65 the people who are 30 are paying your pension that was supposedly part of your compensation for 40 years. In effect they owe YOU money. If they do poorly and don't have money you might find that their liability to you is worthless. In effect, the taxpayers end up paying for it. The right thing to do is that when the liability is accrued money is put aside (i.e. invested, or a lien placed on real estate, or some o
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Why the hell did this get modded insightful?
Although the USPS pension mandate doesn't compare well to an individual's finances (for the simple reason that we can at least hold people accountable for their own failures to plan for retirement), you can still make a much, much better analogy than the drivel y
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Before you call someone a tard, look into the issue. They, over a ten year span, are being forced to: (a) fully fund their current employees' pensions, and (b) fully fund their retirees' pensions. Some opposing politician or commentator derived a "75 years" equivalency from this, which is misleading and meant to make the law seem more ridiculous than it is.
The flaws with the law are the aggressive timetable and the lack of authorization for increased rates, not the full funding of pensions. That is a good i
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Why is this down-rated? Detroit is exactly what happens when pensions go unfunded - which is what the Post Office pensions were when congress passed that law.
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When the PAEA was passed in late 2006, it was at right about the peak in total mail volume (which of course they didn't know at the time) and the recession was still 2 years off. Everyone (Democrats, Republicans, and the postal service and unions) thought the prefunding was easily affordable, so it passed with bipartisan support. For example see this [nalc.org] from the NALC (the main letter carrier's union) giving it high praise. (Although after things went sour, they started insinuating [washingtonpost.com] that it had been shoved down
Actually they do, by law (Score:3)
Occasionally, an employer will get caught screwing around with that and not properly investing that money on behalf of the employees they promised it to. That's called fraud. It's just that federal agencies were allowed to commit this type of fraud. With t
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With the internet, USPS may not have the revenue to in 40 years to cover the retirement pay for today's employees. That's why they now have to invest retirement pay for today's employees today, just like private companies do.
Except USPS has to prefund for 75 years.
They're literally socking away money for employees that haven't been born yet.
false rumor. Only estimate cost of today's promise (Score:2)
They have to ESTIMATE, not pay, what today's employees might collect 75 years from now.
When they hire a 20 year old worker, they are promising to continue paying that worker when he's 80 - which is 60 years from now. They have to make a written estimate of how much today's promises will cost them in the future.
This is standard stuff, what's called Generally Accepted Accounting Practices (GAAP). Every company that issues stock follows the same rules.
the problem is they got forty years behind (Score:2)
What they were doing is using today's revenue to pay retirement for employees who worked forty years ago. Now they have to switch to investing today's revenue for today's workers. Paying as you go, as they are now required to do, isn't a problem. That's how everyone other than government does it. The problem is the switch -
lower than expected returns failing to invest (Score:2)
Since 1974, companies have been legally required to make those investments. The law is called ERISA. USPS now has
btw half the sponsors were democrats (Score:2)
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...and does not usually refer to spending on military, law enforcement or prisons
Why am I not surprised?
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Basically, people who want government to fail set them up to fail. Then they say "look look, big government is failing!"
Yes, but the OP was blaming Republicans, not Democrats.
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NO other company has to do this and UPS and Fed Ex sure as fuck don't do this,
Actually, every privately owned company by law is required to fully fund their liabilities to be considered solvent. That's why they hate liabilities like unused vacation and go to great lengths to avoid them. This just hit the USPS hard in part because it was a sudden change and in part because Congress overestimated its liabilities. Here's a good rundown: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-08-02/understanding-the-post-office-s-benefits-mess.html [bloomberg.com]
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It's a government service that is required to be self-funded and independent. There is no business model. The board of directors is really just Congress, which makes it unique enough that it doesn't qualify as a business.
They exchange legal tender for goods and services and have accounting and HR departments, I assume, but you can't think of it like a business. More specifically, you can't fix the business model - getting
The rest of the story (Score:5, Insightful)
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/03/the-cost-difference-in-mailing-netflx-vs-gamefly-all-of-gameflys-profits/ [arstechnica.com]
The reason GameFly pays more is because their mailers weigh more. Netflix keeps the mailer at 1 ounce and pays 44 cents each. GameFly's mailer is 2 ounces and they pay the two ounce price. The big giant clue in the linked article is that the USPS is considering changing the price of the 2 ounce mailer to the price of a 1 ounce mailer.
So the real story is that GameFly wants a discount with zero actual justification.
The packaging for GameFly costs more. Work it into your business model or reduce the packaging weight.
I don't do business with GameFly but if I did, I'd cancel. They actually have the nerve to pretend Netflix is getting some kind of special treatment while they are the ones seeking it.
There is nothing unfair about what the USPS is doing. The rest of us have to pay by the ounce for our mail.
Re: The rest of the story (Score:5, Insightful)
Not excusing this, but perhaps they've tried and haven't been able to redesign a mailer that doesn't somehow infringe on Netflix's mailer patent (and any others that likely exist):
http://www.google.com/patents/US6966484 [google.com]
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Not excusing this, but perhaps they've tried and haven't been able to redesign a mailer that doesn't somehow infringe on Netflix's mailer patent (and any others that likely exist):
http://www.google.com/patents/US6966484 [google.com]
All they need to do is to license the technology from Netflix. Is that what patents are meant to be all about?
Even I'm not sure if I should be appending that comment with a "</sacasm>" tag or not.
Re: The rest of the story (Score:2)
Maybe. Will that end up costing more than 2 cents per mailer?
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Patents are supposed to stifle competition. That's exactly why they exist. Idiot.
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So true. Changing that is a whole different topic/thread. But we do need to do that. Just for the sake of argument, I suggest dropping the patent system in its entirety. OK, now let the debate begin ... in a separate thread, though.
Re:The rest of the story (Score:4, Interesting)
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/03/the-cost-difference-in-mailing-netflx-vs-gamefly-all-of-gameflys-profits/ [arstechnica.com]
The reason GameFly pays more is because their mailers weigh more. Netflix keeps the mailer at 1 ounce and pays 44 cents each. GameFly's mailer is 2 ounces and they pay the two ounce price. The big giant clue in the linked article is that the USPS is considering changing the price of the 2 ounce mailer to the price of a 1 ounce mailer.
So the real story is that GameFly wants a discount with zero actual justification.
The packaging for GameFly costs more. Work it into your business model or reduce the packaging weight.
I don't do business with GameFly but if I did, I'd cancel. They actually have the nerve to pretend Netflix is getting some kind of special treatment while they are the ones seeking it.
There is nothing unfair about what the USPS is doing. The rest of us have to pay by the ounce for our mail.
Just read the article you linked. While interesting, it does kinda support Gamefly's case. A 2-ounce mailer cost $1.05, whereas a 1-ounce mailer cost $0.44. In other words Gamefly pays ~238% of what Netflix pays, 38% above any differences in weight. Further, at these weights, the majority of the cost of delivery is a flat cost, rather than an increase in fuel consumption due to weight. The cost of fuel to transport 1 ounce of additional weight is certainly less than a penny; the vehicle, occupant, and other cargo make up the vast majority of the weight (and the occupant's time is no small factor on the cost). Just basing numbers on the weight of the packages alone, charging ~$0.10 extra for the additional ounce will more than make up for the added costs.
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http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/03/the-cost-difference-in-mailing-netflx-vs-gamefly-all-of-gameflys-profits/ [arstechnica.com]
The reason GameFly pays more is because their mailers weigh more. Netflix keeps the mailer at 1 ounce and pays 44 cents each. GameFly's mailer is 2 ounces and they pay the two ounce price. The big giant clue in the linked article is that the USPS is considering changing the price of the 2 ounce mailer to the price of a 1 ounce mailer.
So the real story is that GameFly wants a discount with zero actual justification.
The packaging for GameFly costs more. Work it into your business model or reduce the packaging weight.
I don't do business with GameFly but if I did, I'd cancel. They actually have the nerve to pretend Netflix is getting some kind of special treatment while they are the ones seeking it.
There is nothing unfair about what the USPS is doing. The rest of us have to pay by the ounce for our mail.
Just read the article you linked. While interesting, it does kinda support Gamefly's case. A 2-ounce mailer cost $1.05, whereas a 1-ounce mailer cost $0.44. In other words Gamefly pays ~238% of what Netflix pays, 38% above any differences in weight. Further, at these weights, the majority of the cost of delivery is a flat cost, rather than an increase in fuel consumption due to weight. The cost of fuel to transport 1 ounce of additional weight is certainly less than a penny; the vehicle, occupant, and other cargo make up the vast majority of the weight (and the occupant's time is no small factor on the cost). Just basing numbers on the weight of the packages alone, charging ~$0.10 extra for the additional ounce will more than make up for the added costs.
There are other factors you haven't considered. Perhaps larger, thicker, or heavier packages tend to jamb in the automatic processing machines more often, requiring more manual intervention and slowing everything down. And even if that doesn't apply to gamefly's specific case, it may apply to packages greater than 1 ounce in general. And if that's the case, it would justify the post office making a special exception for gamefly since they wouldn't actually be costing more.
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There are other factors you haven't considered. Perhaps larger, thicker, or heavier packages tend to jamb in the automatic processing machines more often, requiring more manual intervention and slowing everything down. And even if that doesn't apply to gamefly's specific case, it may apply to packages greater than 1 ounce in general. And if that's the case, it would justify the post office making a special exception for gamefly since they wouldn't actually be costing more.
Haven't claimed to have considered all factors, just refuting one. :-P
For example, the Ars article indicates that because Netflix does ~97% of the DVD mailer volume, and because of that, and the fact that Netflix mailers are easily identifiable due to their red packaging, they are often sorted out from standard mail and handled differently, reducing costs. I'm not sure how I feel about this, as on the one hand, a business has the right to pass costs (or savings) on to the customer, but on the other, a gover
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Interesting things about "favoring and discriminating." The cost difference is all because of the way that Gamefly ships vs Netflix. That's discriminating based on package weight.
Everything else the arstechnica article is talking about refers to the likelihood of breakage and the time to deliver. Gamefly uses only a few shipping facilities while Netflix has many. If you don't have to ship cross county then things are going to be faster, and thus have less of a chance of breakage.
The other trick is that
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If special handling is required, and special treatment is offered to NetFlix Red mailers, and all of that for a reduced fee (the same as a first class letter) it sounds to me like Gamefly had a significant case. (And the fact that the Post Office is knuckling under would seem to support that).
If the NetFlix mailer is so inconsequential and light weight and offers so little protection for the contents that it requires special handling, it is clearly rate-abuse. They should have never been given special han
Re:The rest of the story (Score:5, Insightful)
I was a Netflix subscriber when they switched over to the current, thin mailers. The story at the time was that the new mailers could be handled by the automated sorting machines at the USPS facilities and that the difference in cost between postage and breakage was strongly on the side of postage - Netflix was willing to absorb the additional breakage, which they expected but at a low level, based on statistical sampling and tests they'd conducted.
One discontinuity is that, I think, the game discs are several multiples more expensive than the DVD's, so GameFly can't absorb as much breakage. That's probably why they've still got the thick mailers and why their subscription prices are 50% higher than Netflix.
It sounds to me like they have a more expensive business model and are asking the USPS to subsidize it.
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I think you're really overestimating the amount of handling actual employees do of standard mail including Netflix envelopes.
After the mail has been collected, it's dumped onto conveyor belts. Envelopes are ran through automated machiner
It's not favoriting to make a process efficient (Score:3)
Netflix does ~97% of the DVD mailer volume, and because of that, and the fact that Netflix mailers are easily identifiable due to their red packaging, they are often sorted out from standard mail and handled differently...on the other, a governmental institution should not be favoring or discriminating.
I would hope like hell that ANY business, government or not, would evolve a special process to handle any one item that represented such a large percentage of traffic. Although it might appear to be favorit
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dumb (Score:2)
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Then Netflix will just start using UPS or Fedex. If it costs the same, why use USPS
Hehehe, have you tried to send a letter with UPS?
At the current rate that prices are increasing on USPS postage (controlled by Congress), it would be centuries before a USPS letter is as expensive as UPS (I believe FedEx is similar).
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In the USA, it is illegal to deliver first class mail unless you are the USPS, unless it is delivered at a cost of 6x the current USPS delivery rate.
http://about.usps.com/who-we-are/postal-history/universal-service-postal-monopoly-history.pdf [usps.com]
We have laws preventing exercise of free enterprise in the delivery of standard mail. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_Express_Statutes [wikipedia.org]
Companies in the past have attempted to circumvent these restrictions and have been run out of business by the government through l
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The reasons for the Postal monopoly are not at first obvious. A Libertarian minded person would cry foul at the legalized monopoly, citing private enterprise being able to do it cheaper. Until one looks at what would happen if the USPS was not the only game in town.
From the USPS Monopoly History link you provided:
"Without such protection, Congress reckoned that private companies would siphon off high-profit delivery routes, leaving only money-losing routes to the Department, which then would be forced to re
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Hehehe, have you tried to send a letter with UPS? At the current rate that prices are increasing on USPS postage (controlled by Congress), it would be centuries before a USPS letter is as expensive as UPS (I believe FedEx is similar).
This is because a business is not allowed to compete with the USPS. You can't compete with a better mail delivery service more than you can compete by printing better money. It by definition has to be something other than mail, which includes charging so much no one will confuse you for the USPS. The USPS is an anachronism in the first world and it's embarrassing that our government still runs our mail service.
Re:dumb (Score:5, Insightful)
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The USPS has their own police force. If they think you've been sending non time sensitive things through anyone but USPS then they're legally allowed to fine a company hundreds of thousands of dollars.
In theory the Post Office gets regulated by congress because congress has granted it a monopoly on certain kinds of mail.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Letter_Mail_Company [wikipedia.org] the post office was not always the cheapest. Who is to say that it would be cheapest today if companies were allowed to compete against it freely? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_Express_Statutes [wikipedia.org]
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Oh, I'm sure they wouldn't be. My point is that your service has to generally be shit for people to be willing to pay a lot more to avoid using you. If they were free to compete like any other business, they would both have to raise their prices and improve their service. It's a win-win.
I definitely understand the value of always retaining a very cheap service for delivering letters (though even at double the current price, it'd be ridiculously cheap and reasonable). For anything other than a standard postc
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Thank you for a very reasonable response. I didn't intend to come off as snarky in my reply. I'm not certain that they would both have to raise their prices, competition generally causes price levels to decrease. The situation I can envision where prices might increase is when due to the halving (let's say that there is only one competitor) of volume, marginal costs might be higher ending up in everyone paying more. I'm not sure if the outcome of the duopoly would result in a price equilibrium situation or
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Then Netflix will just start using UPS or Fedex. If it costs the same, why use USPS when the others offer better service?
Maybe the answer to your question is that IT DOES NOT COST THE SAME?
Netflix is getting a 44 cent rate, the same as a letter. Lets see you get that from UPS or FedeX.
US Post Office is messed up big time (Score:3)
I have Netflix and I'm on one of the bigger plans of 5 at a time and this last week has been a postal service cluster F***. Last Saturday I put 5 DVD's in the mail slot at the post office and on Monday two were received by Netflix and the other three didn't get there until Tuesday. Then on Wednesday I put two back in the mail and one arrived Thursday and the other still didn't arrive on Friday and I had to call and have it declared missing. Now keep in mind that according to the mailers the PO box that it's going to is in the next town over, I can't understand how DVD's that go in the mail at the exact same time some take an extra day to arrive.
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Don't think that I haven't thought of that, someone could have taken those three discs home Saturday and watched them Saturday night and all day Sunday and then put them back in spare mailers in the mail Monday and so they arrived on Tuesday. The question is how would you ever prove that in any kind of complaint, it's impossible.
Re:US Post Office is messed up big time (Score:4, Interesting)
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Don't think that I haven't thought of that, someone could have taken those three discs home Saturday and watched them Saturday night and all day Sunday and then put them back in spare mailers in the mail Monday and so they arrived on Tuesday.
Someone who actually has a job wouldn't spend that much time watching YOUR movies. If you cam out out your mom's basement once in a while you could have a job too.
(I know, right? What was I thinking...).
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I don't usually respond to trolls, but for your information I live in my own house and have a full time job. I share the account with my live in girlfriend and my tenant and we split the cost of the subscription and we each get a few DVD's per week.
Better make sure of your facts before you mouth off.
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Lol. Post your pictures and photos of your mom and dad and girl friend, and maybe I'll believe you.
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I've actually got a sneaking suspicion that this is exactly why Netflix uses envelopes that don't let you see the name of the movie without opening them. There's a little window to make the barcode visible, and they could easily make the title visible as well if they wanted. It would even be useful for customers with a multiple DVD plan. But the risk of theft probably goes up if people are able to see what they're stealing.
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In bulk, you can buy a DVD for less than the price of postage. (Sub 15 cents in industrial quantities),
In the quantities that netflix uses it would make more sense to burn disks on demand, and have a peel off top bar code that would destroy the disk when peeled off. You could put those in one envelope, and trash the DVDs.
It hardly makes sense for them to handle DVDs upon return, clean, Sort, and repackage them for shipment. Way too labor intensive.
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I put 5 DVD's in the mail slot at the post office and on Monday two were received by Netflix and the other three didn't get there until Tuesday.
Oh, NOes! A whole (half) day for non-timesensitive shipment! Big Post Office problem!! Call your congressman!
You have no idea whether these arrived or not.
Far more likely the netflix low-lifes on the shipping dock were on a smoke break and didn't get that box of returned scanned on that shift.
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Gamefly on the other hand. They definitely throttle. If your a heavy users, they will just sit on disks and not send you anything for up to
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Nope. I had Netflix around that time. I sent movies back immediately, and could see when they were received. The turnaround time mailing to me started taking longer than the return trip - noticeably so that I paid attention to the shipped/received status and timing.
I dropped Netflix because it was obviously throttling. A queue of 100-120 movies all the time, of all types - blockbuster, indie, documentary, popular, unp
Why would I click on a PDF story link? (Score:3)
PDFs can contain all sorts of crapware, and Slashdot isn't exactly known for vetting its submissions.
Re:Why would I click on a PDF story link? (Score:5, Informative)
It's from a government site. NSA paranoia aside, a Postal Regulatory Commission complaint is not going to contain some ridiculous scripts or other executable bits.
You always have the option of opening it with the built-in PDF reader on Firefox, which would only be able to open the plain document portion of it if there is anything else embedded.
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PDFs can contain all sorts of crapware, and Slashdot isn't exactly known for vetting its submissions.
PDF from People's Republic of China? no way!
Oh, Postal Regulatory Commission...
Slashdot has SWF ads (Score:2)
Herp Derp.... (Score:2)
It's called media mail. I've been using it for well over 20 years now.
Surprised netflix hasn't (Score:2)
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Why not just cut the CDs and DVDs locally? (Score:2)
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and bust all the mail workers for illegal movie distribution?
Maybe can be a good way to get out paying for retirement plan.
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Evidently, you have more industrious postal workers than I do in my town. Here, all they do is borrow my copy of The Economist and read it in the can for a few days before putting it in my PO box.
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how does making multiple copies of a physical item any cheaper than just moving them when you have no equipment to do such things
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yea you are not going to do this at any scale with a dvd burner bought at walmrt and a spare pc
even a good one = press
otherwise its a garbage copy that will peel off in transit during summer = waste of time
wake up to the world of reliable production
Mail? (Score:2)
What is a DVD?
DVD for areas without cable or DSL (Score:4, Informative)
This is incredible news (Score:2)
I had no idea Blockbuster was still in business.
Rationale? (Score:2)
What is the rationale for subsiding DVD rental?
I understand the special rate means the price difference comes from tax payers' pockets. That could be fine if it was something for the sake of general interest, but here?
Re: Mail DVDs? (Score:2)
For those of us not living in Molly's basement and paying for electricity, Netflix is cheaper than the power to keep your computer running 24x7 as well as the higher bandwidth costs
Moving into cable's service area (Score:2)
I suppose that if you download stuff on a metered cell plan then the bandwidth used to download a DVD worth of data could affect your bill. I'm on cable so it would not affect mine.
In that case, the real estate cost of moving into cable's service area might affect your bill.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
it's the lack of content.
The studios have fixed this problem. The 'for rent' DVDs are now stripped of all the extras. So now they are just as bad as streaming content.
Well, maybe not just as bad. There is still content on DVDs not available via streaming.
Song of the South (Score:3)