Stock up before Monday when Royal Mail 1st class stamps rise by 11 per cent

From April 4, the price of a 1st Class stamp will increase by 10p and the price of a 2nd Class stamp will increase by 2p to 68p.

Royal Mail announced the price rises earlier this month saying that “overall, these changes are broadly in line with inflation and are necessary to ensure the one-price-goes-anywhere Universal Service remains sustainable”.

The Universal Service Obligation (USO) requires Royal Mail to deliver letters to 31 million home and business addresses across the UK six days a week at the same price.

Royal Mail also recently announced that they were adding barcodes to all its regular ‘everyday’ stamps, but that any non-barcoded stamps you have will still be valid until January 31, 2023.

If you won’t be able to use all of your stamps by that date you can swap them out for new barcoded ones.

The swap scheme opened today, March 31, and you can find out more here.

Beat the price hike by stocking up on stamps this weekend, but make sure they are barcoded.