Postmarks and Postal Possession

<RULE> POSTAL SERVICE <CFR>39 CFR Part 111</CFR> <SUBJECT>Postmarks and Postal Possession</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Postal Service. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The Postal Service is adding section 608.11, “Postmarks and Postal Possession,” to the Domestic Mail Manual (DMM). This new section defines postmarks, identifies the types of Postal Service markings that qualify as postmarks, and describes the circumstances under which those markings are applied. It also advises customers of how to obtain evidence of the date on which the Postal Service accepts possession of their mailings. This new language in the DMM does not change any existing postal operations or postmarking practices, but is instead intended to improve public understanding of postmarks and their relationship to the date of mailing. </SUM> <DATES> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> Effective December 24, 2025. </DATES> <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Martha Johnson, Senior Public Relations Representative, at <E T="03">martha.s.johnson@usps.gov</E> or (202) 268-2000. </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Table of Contents</HD> <EXTRACT> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">I. Introduction</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">II. Comments</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">III. Response to Comments</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">IV. Explanation of Final Rules</FP> </EXTRACT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Introduction</HD> On August 12, 2025, the Postal Service published a proposed rule in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> , Postmarks and Postal Possession, 90 FR 38716 (Aug. 11, 2025) (hereafter “the Proposed Rule”). The Proposed Rule defined the postmark and explained the Postal Service's operational use of the postmark; identified the types of Postal Service markings that qualify as postmarks (together with certain auxiliary markings and scan data that are generated during the course of postal operations and that indicate postal possession of a mailpiece but do not qualify as postmarks); described how and where in the course of postal operations such markings are applied; and clarified the scope of information that such markings do and do not convey. The Proposed Rule further advised that, while the presence of a postmark on a mailpiece confirms that the Postal Service was in possession of the mailpiece on the date of the postmark's inscription, the postmark date does not inherently or necessarily align with the date on which the Postal Service first accepted possession of the mailpiece. The Proposed Rule further noted that this lack of alignment has and will become more common with the implementation of the Regional Transportation Optimization (RTO) initiative and the corresponding adoption of “leg”-based service standards. (90 FR 10857). The Proposed Rule then advised customers to request a manual (local) postmark at a retail location if they want to ensure that their mailpiece receives a postmark containing a date that aligns with the date on which the Postal Service first accepted possession of their mailpiece, and reminded customers who wish to retain proof of the date on which the Postal Service first accepted possession of their mailpiece(s) of the services (including Certificates of Mailing) that provide such proof. Finally, the Proposed Rule submitted a new Section 608.11 of the Domestic Mail Manual (DMM), for the public's consideration. While the Postal Service has chosen to utilize the notice-and-comment rulemaking process for this Proposed Rule, we note that this is not a rulemaking in the traditional sense. As stated in the Proposed Rule, nothing in DMM Section 608.11 effectuates any changes in how, or the extent to which, the Postal Service applies postmarks to mailpieces. However, the postmark was not previously defined in any current Postal Service regulations, and the Postal Service considered it appropriate to reflect these existing practices in the DMM to ensure that customers have a clear understanding of the postmark and what it means. The Proposed Rule sought public input on DMM Section 608.11, welcoming the perspectives of customers, government entities, industry stakeholders, and other interested parties. In particular, the Proposed Rule solicited recommendations on how to effectively inform customers of the new DMM provision and explain its meaning and feasible suggestions to advise and accommodate customers who want proof of the date on which the Postal Service first accepted possession of their mailings. <HD SOURCE="HD1">II. Comments</HD> The Postal Service received 130 comments on the Proposed Rule, approximately 80 of which consisted of form letters—or, more precisely, one of three distinct form letters (each one using similar, if not verbatim, language) submitted multiple times. Issues raised by these letters include the alleged “dilution” of the postmark's meaning, impacts on rural and sparsely populated regions, and the importance of postmarks for mail-in ballots and other documents ( <E T="03">e.g.,</E> tax returns) subject to strict deadlines. Approximately 25 additional comments were submitted by members of the public writing on their own behalf; these comments range from simple statements of opposition to detailed critiques of proposed DMM Section 608.11. Numerous commenters—among them several election officials, one county Board of Elections, and certain independent institutions—expound at length on mail-in voting, raising concerns about postmarking deadlines and potentially discarded Ballot Mail. Finally, some industry mailers and labor organizations contributed comments echoing the concerns of other commenters, notably with regard to mail-in voting, postmarking deadlines more generally, and the need for robust public education and outreach. These concerns are discussed more fully below. Some commenters suggested operational or staffing changes, new or expanded product offerings, educational outreach endeavors, various means of communicating relevant information to customers, and detailed revisions to DMM Section 608.11. The Postal Service thanks these commenters for their recommendations, which are discussed more fully below. Some comments raised issues (and/or advanced arguments) outside the scope of the present rulemaking. These issues and arguments, which will be excluded from the discussion below, include: • <E T="03">Criticism of mail-in voting as a general practice.</E> While the Proposed Rule contains information of potential relevance to election officials and to citizens who choose to vote by mail, the Postal Service does not administer elections, establish the rules or deadlines that govern elections, or determine whether or how election jurisdictions utilize the mail or incorporate our postmark into their rules. The Postal Service also does not advocate for or against any particular voting practices (including mail-in voting). Instead, the Postal Service collects, processes, transports, and delivers mail and packages that are mailable under federal law. As part of that role, we deliver the nation's Election Mail when public policy makers and election officials choose to use the mail as a part of their election system and when citizens choose to utilize our services to participate in an election. • <E T="03">Concerns about missed or belatedly applied postmarks.</E> As explained in the Proposed Rule, DMM Section 608.11 in no way signals a change in our postmarking procedures; postmarks will continue to be applied to Single-Piece First Class Mail pieces, both letter-shaped and flat-shaped, in the same manner and to the same extent as before. Of course, mistakes occur in the normal course of postal operations; the Proposed Rule explains as much, noting that occasional circumstances may arise where a legible postmark is not applied (for instance when two mailpieces are stuck together as they run through a cancelling machine, when the machine runs out of ink or smears when applying postmarks, and so forth). For this reason, we have informed our customers who choose to vote by mail that they can “ensure that a postmark is applied to [their] return ballot by visiting a Postal Service retail [location] and requesting a postmark from a retail associate when dropping off the ballot.” Kit 600, <E T="03">USPS Postmarking Guidelines</E> (2024), <E T="03">available at https://about.usps.com/kits/kit600/kit600_039.htm.</E> That same guidance would also address concerns about postmark dates, as the date on a manual (local) postmark applied at retail location aligns with the date that the customer tendered the return ballot for mailing. The present rulemaking, however, does not involve any operational changes that would increase the frequency of missed or misapplied postmarks; it is intended to explain the Postal Service's operational use of the postmark and to clarify what information postmarks can be reliably taken to convey. • <E T="03">Criticisms of the Delivering for America (DFA) strategic plan.</E> As noted in the Proposed Rule, RTO increases the likelihood that a postmark applied at originating processing facilities—the locations where postmarks are typically applied—will contain a date that does not align with the date on which the Postal Service first accepted possession of the mailpiece. RTO was the subject of an earlier rulemaking (90 FR 10857) and separate proceedings before the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC Docket No. N2024-1). The Proposed Rule here is intended to define the postmark and inform the public of its meaning and operational uses. While the need for such clarification is due in part to RTO's changes to transportation and processing schedules, which will enable the Postal Service to significantly increase our operational efficiency and reduce costs, thereby supporting our efforts to continue to provide u ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 65k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━