Postal Service Sees 32-Cent Stamp as Answer to Red Ink

The Postal Service Board of Governors on Tuesday proposed raising the price of a first-class stamp to 32 cents as part of a general increase in postal rates.

The proposal now goes to the independent Postal Rate Commission, which has 10 months to hold hearings and rule on the request. If approved, the new rates would take effect in 1995.

The current 29-cent rate was imposed on Feb. 3, 1991.

The three-cent increase for a first-class stamp would cost the average household between 60 cents and 75 cents a month, postal officials estimated. But it would mean nearly $3 billion in added revenue for an operation that lost $1.7 billion last year and is struggling to hold the red ink to $1.3 billion in 1994.

“None of us wants to raise postage rates,” Postmaster General Marvin T. Runyon Jr. said. “We’re sensitive to the impact of our price increases on customers.”

Runyon and Postal Board Chairman J. Sam Winters called the proposed increase moderate and said it would require continued cost-cutting by the agency.

A larger increase “would have been a safer, less-demanding course,” Runyon said. But he added that a sharp increase also would have cost the post office business from companies sending large volumes of mail.

Instead, the post office accepted a proposal by the Mailer’s Council, which represents major corporations and associations that send out billions of pieces of mail. It called for an across-the-board increase of 10.3%, which is essentially what the postal governors proposed.

Included in the proposal are a 32-cent charge for the first ounce of a first-class letter and 25 cents for each additional ounce. That is up from the current price of 29 cents for the first ounce and 23 cents for each added ounce.

Postcards would increase from 19 cents to 21 cents and other rates would rise accordingly.

The plan calls for a rate increase of about 10.3% for first- and second-class regular-rate mail, 10.2% for third-class and 13.2% for fourth-class.

First class is cards and letters, second is magazines and other periodicals, third class is advertising and fourth class is parcels.