I recently developed a stamp calculator web application. You can enter a price you want your stamps to add up to, the price you do not want to exceed, the number of stamps you want to use to achieve that price, and some stamps. It currently looks like this:
It works for any country. I have heard from other members that it is useful, so I am suggesting for it to be put somewhere on the official Postcrossing website as a tool that people can use.
I was thinking that I could change the theme in my app to use Postcrossing’s color theme, or it could just be a completely separate tool that is just linked somewhere. I was thinking that it could be under Explore > Other Links, or just under Explore on the official website.
I am looking for the opinions of other postcrossers, do you think that this tool could be useful to other members of Postcrossing? Would it be a useful tool to link somewhere on the official website?
I am also seeing if anybody has any suggestions on how to make this more useful to postcrossers. Is there something that would make this tool better or more user friendly?
UPDATE: It has been decided that this will not be added anywhere on the official Postcrossing website, but I still hope some people can find it useful! I am going to keep maintaining it so feel free to comment any ideas that might make this a more useful tool for people to use for Postcrossing.
Well, Postcrossing is about postcards and not about stamps.
Several / beautiful stamps are a nice bonus, nothing else.
In my eyes there is no need for a stamp calculator. If I’d like to put several stamps on a card I know that they should be (for Germany) 45+50, 60+20+15, 90+5 and so on…
I love beautiful stamps and I love variety, but I do not see any real reason to use that calculator. I still need to know/ search for the right rates that I need, and if I’m unsure what stamps I need to add up to the right postage, I just take a normal calculator (I put there the price needed for the piece of mail I want to send, have in mind what kind of stamps I’m able to use - and just subract them from the price until I’m at 0
While that is a nice item, you are assuming that people use multiple stamps on their outgoing cards. I can’t quantify it, but I am guessing that many US members buy one Forever stamp for International mailing…and they are done. As @grizzabella said, multiple stamps are a nice bonus. (I always use multiple stamps).
I often use many low value stamps on my cards, so this is helpful
I use a calculator - but this app suggests different combinations I can use with the stamps I have. Well done.
I think this would be perfect. the thing about using a regular calculator is that you can’t see all the calculations that meet your criteria at once, with this, you put in your criteria, all the stamps you have, and it pops out with all the combinations that work.
Because of this, I really like it! Especially when I have a lot of different stamp denominations. Perhaps with a retheme it would be perfect for postcrossing! It could be placed in one of the drop down boxes at the top and could maybe be linked under the postcard ID/address page when you send a postcard for easy access.
I recently bought a heap of old stamps of quite low denomination, so now I have stamps worth
0,50 - 1 - 2 - 2,30 - 2,40 - 2,60 - 2,80 - 2,90 - 3,20 - 3,35 - 3,70 - 4,50 - 5 - 5,50 - 6 - 6,50 - 7,50 - 14 - and 15 crowns.
Now making that 30,00 crowns, while using even the lowest denominations and still having enough space for address, text and some decorations can be quite challenging . It’s fun, but it sometimes takes a lot of time, especially if I might want to use 2 specific stamps (which for example match the card’s image) and have to choose the other stamps based on that. Of course I can just take two 15 crowns stamps, and I often do, but I like those older stamps better.
It really depends on the country and the prices for postal fees are changing really often in my country. I tried to use this calculator once for Polish stamps and I got really confused.
I actually don’t see a version I could use (with Polish currency) but it would also be of limited use to me, as our commemorative stamps are HUGE (1 stamp can be as big as 3 US ones), so using more than two doesn’t leave much space for a message
I usually use one commemorative stamp and one definitive stamp and that’s as much space as I want to dedicate to stamps on the card. The rest is for the message&address
I used this app awhile back to create a table for stamp quantities based on the value of the stamp and the desire to use a minimum number of stamp (and limit, if I can, using the international stamp [e.g. round stamp]). Personally, I wouldn’t use the app that much, but it could be valuable for new Postcrossers who are learning about multiple stamp possibilities.
Hi Emily,
Wow, this is exactly what I’ve been searching for! It is great that you can finally see all the possible combinations at once - it’s amazing!
It’s especially helpful in a region when you have a ton of different stamp denominations to work with.
I personally think It would be perfect for postcrossing with a little retheme. I can picture it now, a drop-down box at the top with this tool as an option, and maybe even a link under the postcard ID/address page for easy access when sending postcards.
Could you add decimals to 3 decimal places, as it is currently a bit difficult for currencies such as £ which have had ½ penny stamps issued. At the moment 2½p rounds to 3p, when it should round down to 2p on its own.
It also seems to get confused if you add a lot of stamp values. If I add 1p, 2p, 5p, 10p, 20p, 50p, 68p and 95p (the currently issued values of stamps) it will show the same sum in different orders to make £1.85.
Hello! I just updated the app so that when you use the currency £, it will correct the answers to three decimal places.
Also, thank you for letting me know about that other issue. Not sure why it’s doing that, but I tested it myself and saw it as well. I’ll look into getting that fixed asap
. It’s fun, but it sometimes takes a lot of time, especially if I might want to use 2 specific stamps (which for example match the card’s image) and have to choose the other stamps based on that. Of course I can just take two 15 crowns stamps, and I often do, but I like those older stamps better.
Fantastic idea 
Thank you so much for sharing! 
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