How much to mail it?

The U.S. Postal Service is probably the last place consumers think they have to be on guard against aggressive pricing and overcharging.

That's what Jason Savage, a Raleigh entrepreneur, thought until a recent trip to a Willow Spring post office.

Savage went there to mail a musical card. He was charged $1.30 for the 1.3-ounce envelope, which he considered too high.

When he called customer service to complain, he got conflicting information.

One person told him he should have been charged $1.14; another said 97 cents.

Curious, I took a similar card to the post office in downtown Raleigh and was charged 58 cents. David Partenheimer, spokesman for the USPS, said he couldn't explain why Savage was quoted different prices.

"I never questioned their rates before," Savage said. "I always used the U.S. post office, because I felt I was getting the best price, and their service was just as quick as anyone else."

Something Savage and many others forget is that the U.S. Postal Service is a business, not a civil agency whose sole purpose is to serve us.

It stopped receiving federal funding 1971 and has struggled since to strike a balance between being a quasi-federal agency and a major corporation.

As a federal agency, it is under a mandate to provide mail service to all U.S. residents, even if that means keeping an office open in a remote area that serves just a few people.

But as a for-profit corporation, it has to make money, even as it contends with increasing competition from overnight delivery companies and other mail-services businesses.

To generate new streams of revenue, the Postal Service has added services, including package tracking and overnight delivery. It also has beefed up its sales strategies, promoting higher-priced services over more economical choices.

For example, tell the clerk you want to send a package, and the first price you'll be quoted is the highest -- overnight delivery.

You often have to ask if there is a less expensive option.

"It's more up-selling than leaving out information," said Carl Walton, spokesman for the Postal Service in Greensboro.

"The purpose is to offer the best and fastest service possible," he said. "If that service is $27, we are going to quote that first."

The USPS also has developed new price structures. For example, in May, it began a shaped-based pricing system: The cost of mailing certain letters and packages is based on shape as well as weight. The system includes a surcharge for odd-shaped envelopes that have to be processed by hand, rather than by machine. Other package rates increased as well.

Partenheimer said USPS clerks receive training and should know the new rates.

But after his experience with the envelope, Savage doubts that. "I think they are confused," he said. "We've talked to four different people, and every one came up with a different price for the same letter."

He worries that more people will be overcharged.

I have no problem with the Postal Service acting as a making-money business. But savvy consumers need to treat it that way: Ask for the lowest price, and always shop around.