Accurate piece weights are required to ensure proper postage payment.
1-7.1 Piece weights may be determined by scales or by a method of predetermining the weights.
1-7.2 If scales are used, they must be zero-balanced daily and maintained to the manufacturer’s specifications.
1-7.3 For predetermined weights, a written explanation of how the piece weights are calculated is required. Weights must be updated when new shipments are received, suppliers are changed, or items are added to the inventory.
1-7.4 There is an option to overstate piece weights to prevent the underpayment of postage when using predetermined weights. To avoid underpayment of postage for pieces at or near the weight or rate break point, the mailer may overstate the weight and postage. When this occurs, the actual postage will be recorded as the same as the manifest postage during postage sampling, and these pieces will not be charged as incorrect. If this option is chosen, it will be included in the authorization letter or Business Mailer Support (BMS) authorized agreement. (See Exhibit 4 for more details.)
1-7.5 The postage or weight for each piece is recorded on the manifest by the computer. The weights must be reported to four decimal places. If the manifest document cannot report to four decimal places, the Postal Service will consider the additional digits as zeros for computation purposes.
1-7.6 Piece weights for some rates may be shown as rounded to whole numbers, and the postage rate would not be affected. For example, a weight of 2.2545 pounds for a Parcel Post® piece could be shown on the manifest as 2.2545 or 3.0000, and the rate would be the same.
1-7.7 If the weights are rounded to whole numbers, then the actual total weight of the mailing must be shown on the postage statement, except if the mailing is prepared according to 1-5.6, and then the weight reported on the postage statement would be the rounded weight. If it is a plant-verified drop shipment mailing, the actual weight must also be shown on PS Form 8125, Plant-Verified Drop Shipment (PVDS) Verification and Clearance.
1-7.8 Priority Mail® dimensional weight pieces have a calculated weight on which postage is based. Both actual weight and the postage based weight must be reflected on the manifest.
