December ispeak seasonfor the U.S. Postal Service . The mediocre haul for the USPS on a typical day is 523 million piece of mail , and that increase to 553 million pieces from Thanksgiving to New Year ’s Eve . ( On the busiest twenty-four hours , December 16 , the postal armed service work approximately 640 million pieces . ) Throughout the holidays , they deliver about 15.5 billion pieces of mail in full [ PDF ] .
The USPS has a corporate world-wide terminus for the stamps , meters , and other item used to sue ring mail : “ postage stamp evidencing system . ” The ink markings on the upper - veracious recess are foretell “ information - free-base indicia , ” and they denote a piece has been paid for and signal where to enter it into the ring armor menstruation .
Postal marks — manually - exhort ink scoring stamped over a mould — are the oldest , most canonical “ indicia ” and date back to 1660s England . At their most canonical , they show the recipient role where and when the piece of mail go into the postal system . In addition , postal marks have the duple purpose of marking a impression as canceled and used . In complex compositor’s case , some show the item ’s history of coming back and forward and equipment casualty . In the past times , some postal agencies have had unparalleled postmark betoken the item ’s method of change of location ( railway line , stagecoach , ship , etc . ) . U.S. mail charge with a seal still bears the metropolis and state from which the mail was sent and the date and time the USPS took detention of the item . It also often features a design , ranging from Lady Liberty to the snowflakes and content of “ Happy Holidays ” assume by the USPS for the merry season .
As for those serial numbers on postal service send via an office postage stamp metre , those numbers are trafficker codes . They break the meter ’s manufacturer and poser . ( There are currently six private contractor licence to provide meters to the USPS : Data - Pac Mailing Systems , Francotyp - Postalia , Neopost , Pitney Bowes , Endicia , and Stamps.com ) . The series of numbers beginning with 000 is a serial bit for the specific meter .
In one part of the country , people “ hack ” the USPS ’s indicia to make their holiday mail even more festive . Each year , specially holly - jolly denizens from neighboring townsflock toBethlehem , Pennsylvania , on the easterly sharpness of the state , to have their holiday mail stamped from Bethlehem .
