Hi all!
I had a confusing experience at a post office and was wondering if anyone could help shed some light on the situation.
So I went in, grabbed 4 of the prepaid postcards off the shelf and went up to pay for them. I asked the cashier if she had any international $3 stamps (because they’ve never had them at other stores I’ve asked but I figure it can’t hurt to ask) to which she said “the $3 international greeting card ones? No, but I can print you some.”
I’ve never heard of them being able to do that so I said it’d be awesome. She then grabs one of the postcards I was buying and puts it on the scale and starts typing something on the computer. I mention that it’s for some other cards I got recently because I usually use prepaid postcards like the ones I’m buying and I end up saying “I didn’t know you could print out stamps here,” to which she says “oh no, we can’t, I’m printing you a label.”
I had no idea what that meant so I said “a label?” and she picks up the card, and puts her index and thumb on the card and drag them along to show like a long strip along the top of the postcard and says “a label”. I was confused and just said thank you but I’ll just grab the postcards this time. Does anyone know what label she was referring to? Is it just a printed version of a stamp or like a parcel postage label?
When I’ve gotten stamps before they always tell me they can make up the $3 out of other stamps, but she didn’t mention this. When I think of labels for postage I think of like those they use on parcels, which would make weighing the postcard make sense, but that was a prepaid postcard and therefore not the one I’d use, and also definitely under the required weight limit for postcards, and also it’s a flat rate so what would weighing it change? With the way she gestured on the card it made it seem like a long label across the top of the card. Maybe she needed to weigh something to make the label and was just going to edit the weight or cost per weight to make it a $3 paid postage label but I didn’t know you could put them on postcards and I mentioned that I wanted to get into using stamps more because I didn’t like how plain the back of the prepaid cards were so I wouldn’t think the solution to that would be a plain postage label.
I’ve tried googling but can’t find anything about AusPost using labels for postcards.
I’m fairly new to using stamps, I’m used to the prepaid cards but want to send more stamps out, so is it a thing to use a label of some kind?
Appreciate any and all input, thank you!
Over in Singapore, it’s common for the post office to issue postage labels for parcels and even for normal mail. But these are boring bar coded labels unlike the ones available at the self service machine.
SingaporePost has many self service machines islandwide that postage labels of any amount can be bought and printed out - these are usually pictorial ones like this.
Not really a thing for small letters although they can do it (maybe I will ask for one next time I send a domestic letter). The label is a bit smaller than a parcel label because it’s unbarcoded; you often get one on large international letters but it is pretty plain.
I think it’s pretty rare for letters (or postcards) in Australia to use a postage label (like on a parcel) but I’ve definitely seen it — unfortunately they won’t be pretty!
You can always ask for the New Zealand rate stamps + either 30c or 10c+20c, which should be more available 
Aww that’s cute! I didn’t know there were self serve machines, that’s so cool! So that just goes over where you normally put the stamp on the postcard? Is it very long?
Is it the same for postcards? I’m pretty sure she knew it was a stamp for a postcard, but maybe she thought it was for a letter? Or maybe she thought I wanted a stamp for a letter to send my postcard in
Ahh, so it probably was a parcel postage label for a postcard? I’m using a combo of the $2.90 and 10c stamps at the moment, but some designs on the back of the card make it hard to fit them in without covering it up and I didn’t want to have to pay for postage buying the $3 stamps online and was worried that if I bought enough to get free shipping that I wouldn’t use them all or the rate would go up (although I know realistically it shouldn’t go up soon cause of how recently it did). Does the $2.70 + 30/10+10 combo fit better?
No, it would be either two or three stamps the same size as what you’re using now so it wouldn’t help. I think the 50c international is the only one that’s really smaller, but $2.50 stamps won’t be easy to come by now either. For what it’s worth, you can leave a gap between the stamps so often if there’s a pretty design or info I don’t want to cover in the middle I’ll just put some stamps on the right and some on the left.
Australia Post treats postcards and letters the same in the mail stream so even though the rate is now different I think of them as the same. Sorry for not being super clear :-).
Oooh that’s pretty cool! I didn’t know you could separate the stamps, I’m assuming they just need to be up the top and at least one on the far right?
Awww those are gorgeous! I’m jealous, both of them and the self serve machines
Ahh, sorry I’m new to stamps for letters too, haha, I usually use the prepaid envelopes
Forgot to ask earlier, you mentioned they use a smaller label without a barcode, is it still plain? What’s printed on it if there’s no barcode? Is it just “postage paid” or something?
Yeah IIRC it has quite a bit of info on it, the cost, the actual service (“International Economy Air - Untracked”), the country and zone, probably some other stuff although I’ve only had one printed once so I don’t remember the full structure. So it’s smaller than a parcel label but not by much.
I’m not really sure what the official guidance is on stamp placement but I’ve never had a problem with unusual placements. It might slow it down slightly — I take a lot of my mail to the post office for postmarking, but if I don’t then anything with unusual stamps seems to end up with a hand-stamped postmark from the local letter facility, which I imagine is a slower process than the automated machines.
Here are some things I’ve sent with no trouble 
($3.30 on that last one because of the extra 10% to use domestic stamps for international policy):
Thank you for all the help and knowledge everyone!
So it seems like it was just a communication issue and she was going to print a small postage label, but I don’t need to worry about getting a $3 stamp since I can get creative with how I place my stamps