Royal Mail barcoding stamps - existing stamps valid only until 31 Jan 2023

kalsha

Can someone clarify 2 things for me please.
I have a few of these presentation packs with regional stamps (see photo).

1)    Will I be able to use these if posting in England?   If they are not worth much, I am thinking of breaking up the presentation packs and use up the stamps - at least I will be able to recoup the face value.  Do I have to use them before January 2023?

2)     Can they  be swapped for the new stamps?

soolin

kalsha said:

Can someone clarify 2 things for me please.
I have a few of these presentation packs with regional stamps (see photo).

1)    Will I be able to use these if posting in England?   If they are not worth much, I am thinking of breaking up the presentation packs and use up the stamps - at least I will be able to recoup the face value.  Do I have to use them before January 2023?

2)     Can they  be swapped for the new stamps?

Yes they can be used in England and yes they can be swapped for new stamps. I’m using up all sorts of weird and wonderful things!

molerat

soolin said:

kalsha said:

Can someone clarify 2 things for me please.
I have a few of these presentation packs with regional stamps (see photo).

1)    Will I be able to use these if posting in England?   If they are not worth much, I am thinking of breaking up the presentation packs and use up the stamps - at least I will be able to recoup the face value.  Do I have to use them before January 2023?

2)     Can they  be swapped for the new stamps?

Yes they can be used in England and yes they can be swapped for new stamps. I’m using up all sorts of weird and wonderful things!

And yes they will expire in January

custardy

Not really worth a separate thread but I certainly wouldn't wait till the 11th hour to swap out stamps.
RM has brought in plans to massively slash manager numbers and the pay/structure UK wide with some higher level changes already been brought in.
Managers union CMA is expected to be balloting for strike action.
Postie union the CWU has made early noises on their own pay and conditions agreement negotiations.
Things could get interesting in the next few months

NBLondon

kalsha said:

Can someone clarify 2 things for me please.
I have a few of these presentation packs with regional stamps (see photo).

1)    Will I be able to use these if posting in England?   If they are not worth much, I am thinking of breaking up the presentation packs and use up the stamps - at least I will be able to recoup the face value.  Do I have to use them before January 2023?

2)     Can they  be swapped for the new stamps?

1) Yes.  May be better to have a look at whether those packs are selling on eBay at the moment and judge the price you might get.  If you do break them, the problem is that you will be putting 2 or 3 of them together to make up the current values and you will end up overpaying or with a stamp or two leftover.  Plus everything will probably be treated as second class even if you make the values up to 95p.   They will be invalidated in Jan 23 as with the others.

2) Yes.  The total value will be totalled up and you'll get it back in 2nd class.

Up until this weekend there was no news on whether the current versions of these were going to get a barcoded version but the website changed to suggest that they will.  No news on whether there will be new designs; or will they use the current ones (https://shop.royalmail.com/special-stamp-issues/definitives/country-definitives) and what values.  (Presumably the £1.70 will be replaced by a £1.85)

Rantband

NBLondon said:

kalsha said:

Can someone clarify 2 things for me please.
I have a few of these presentation packs with regional stamps (see photo).

1)    Will I be able to use these if posting in England?   If they are not worth much, I am thinking of breaking up the presentation packs and use up the stamps - at least I will be able to recoup the face value.  Do I have to use them before January 2023?

2)     Can they  be swapped for the new stamps?

1) Yes.  May be better to have a look at whether those packs are selling on eBay at the moment and judge the price you might get.  If you do break them, the problem is that you will be putting 2 or 3 of them together to make up the current values and you will end up overpaying or with a stamp or two leftover.  Plus everything will probably be treated as second class even if you make the values up to 95p.   They will be invalidated in Jan 23 as with the others.

2) Yes.  The total value will be totalled up and you'll get it back in 2nd class.

Up until this weekend there was no news on whether the current versions of these were going to get a barcoded version but the website changed to suggest that they will.  No news on whether there will be new designs; or will they use the current ones (https://shop.royalmail.com/special-stamp-issues/definitives/country-definitives) and what values.  (Presumably the £1.70 will be replaced by a £1.85)

The link does not work.

BooJewels

Only because of the bracket at the end - just edit it out and it works fine.

soolin

NBLondon said:

kalsha said:

Can someone clarify 2 things for me please.
I have a few of these presentation packs with regional stamps (see photo).

1)    Will I be able to use these if posting in England?   If they are not worth much, I am thinking of breaking up the presentation packs and use up the stamps - at least I will be able to recoup the face value.  Do I have to use them before January 2023?

2)     Can they  be swapped for the new stamps?

1) Yes.  May be better to have a look at whether those packs are selling on eBay at the moment and judge the price you might get.  If you do break them, the problem is that you will be putting 2 or 3 of them together to make up the current values and you will end up overpaying or with a stamp or two leftover.  Plus everything will probably be treated as second class even if you make the values up to 95p.   They will be invalidated in Jan 23 as with the others.

2) Yes.  The total value will be totalled up and you'll get it back in 2nd class.

Up until this weekend there was no news on whether the current versions of these were going to get a barcoded version but the website changed to suggest that they will.  No news on whether there will be new designs; or will they use the current ones (https://shop.royalmail.com/special-stamp-issues/definitives/country-definitives) and what values.  (Presumably the £1.70 will be replaced by a £1.85)

They won't be worth selling, there's a set here that sold for £2.40 with free postage, so seller would have got about £1.92 after fees from which postage would need to be paid- and the stamps are worth £3.27. (this is what I alluded to in a previous thread about being able to buy valid stamps for less than face value).

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Scotland-Wales-Northern-Ireland-Definitive-Presentation-Pack-26-/255355425448?hash=item3b745e92a8:g:cLUAAOSwWnth8wss&nma=true&si=DkxDSvT4TOfmn9d6G1l0rdLdO54%3D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

They would be easy to use up with the addition of a few extra 1 or 2p stamps which can easily be purchased. No need to waste any value.

NBLondon

I know that....  I get half of my postage by buying presentation packs at under face value.  And I have sometimes bought older low values when they neatly added up to the current price by pairing them.  39p + 28p = 1p to make second class works, or 2x39p + 18p to overpay 2nd class.  But you can't use all those values neatly.   Maybe if you are sending parcels or large letter on an A4 envelope.  If I wanted a lot of second class postage - I'd look for a sheet of 34p going cheap.

Or indeed -  look at this seller as an example:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/165412450499?hash=item268359b0c3:g:leoAAOSwIV9iRs-J

Win any of these at starting price of £4 (there are several) and you have 10 usable first class at under half price.  Non-expiring ones as well.  You can throw away the rest of the sheet if it's not interesting.

soolin

NBLondon said:

I know that....  I get half of my postage by buying presentation packs at under face value.  And I have sometimes bought older low values when they neatly added up to the current price by pairing them.  39p + 28p = 1p to make second class works, or 2x39p + 18p to overpay 2nd class.  But you can't use all those values neatly.   Maybe if you are sending parcels or large letter on an A4 envelope.  If I wanted a lot of second class postage - I'd look for a sheet of 34p going cheap.

Or indeed -  look at this seller as an example:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/165412450499?hash=item268359b0c3:g:leoAAOSwIV9iRs-J

Win any of these at starting price of £4 (there are several) and you have 10 usable first class at under half price.  Non-expiring ones as well.  You can throw away the rest of the sheet if it's not interesting.

I don’t worry about making the value neatly, if it takes 7 stamps to make my value up then I’ll use 7 stamps. Also, and perhaps it’s just certain areas, I’ve been using a lot of 1st class stamps plus smaller denominations to make up 2nd class postage and quite a few are arriving next day! I had a number of £1.99 large letters going out in the past few weeks and using a couple of 1st class stamps before starting with the smaller denominations made it easier. 

A lot of the presentation packs I have are very old, so I have a lot of very low denomination stamps like 3p 7p and 11p and I have several sheets of 1p and 2p stamps to make up the shortfall to save any waste.