Welcomes to 2017. Its a new year, time for a fresh start and the annual tradition of people making resolutions that they will give up on in a few weeks and USPS is raising there rates. So lets go over a few of the changes that will affect Amazon and eBay sellers this year.

Lets start with the flat rate prices. The prices listed below are all commercial plus rates, this is what top rated sellers on eBay pay for shipping. If you are not a top rated seller or if you are an Amazon seller you will be paying slightly more.

The increase in the padded flat rate is the real killer for me. The padded envelope was a great value a few years ago but USPS has really increased the price and sucked much of the value out of it. Personally, I don’t use the other flat rate boxes too often because I find weight based shipping to usually be a cheaper option.

Now lets look at some weight based Priority Mail rates. Again the figures below are commercial plus prices.

A few things to consider when looking at the table above. First, don’t worry about zone 9. Few, if any, packages will ever be shipped to zone 9 and people in those locations are already used to paying ridiculous shipping prices. Second, notice that the biggest jump in price is always when you go past zone 4. You may find it helpful to refer back to this table throughout 2017 and when you have a package going to zones 5, 6, 7, 8 or 9 check to see if their is a cheaper flat rate or regional rate available.

Speaking of regional rates lets take a look at them next (Not sure what regional rates are? Check out THIS POST!)

Wow, look how brutal the Box B price jump is for zones 6+. All of the Priority Mail prices in the tables above are going to affect sellers living on the coasts much more then those of us in the middle of the country. If you’re living along the edges it is very important to know all of your shipping options and to be diligent about using flat rate shipping when it is a cheaper option.

Lastly we are going to look at First Class Mail rates.

eBay and Amazon will both automatically update their shipping calculators to make sure all the prices are correct. If you have any free shipping offers remember to adjust your price to account for the higher shipping costs this year.