CALCULATING PARCEL POST BY HAND (Don't go there.)

To calculate what it costs to send a box by Parcel Post, our government wants you to get a postal zone table for zones measured  from your home town, like the one on the main page, and to use the two tables below and do these steps:  

1. Find the BMC city or the ASF city that serves your Zip code.

You can think of a BMC/ASF as a big mailing center or an automatic sorting facility.  The largest BMC/ASF is the State of Alaska.  Even physically smaller BMC/ASFs can embrace destinations that are as much as 5 zones away.

2. Inter or intra? See if the parcel's destination is or is not in a Zip code also served by your own BMC or ASF.  Now you know if this is a intra- or an inter-BMC/ASF shipment.

3. Get the zone.   For an inter-BMC/ASF shipment,  use the destination Zip and a zone table sheet calculated from your home town like the one above for my town to get the destination zone.

4. Decide whether or not you have a nice little machinable box.

A parcel is “machinable” and cheaper if it is not more than 34 inches long, or 17 inches high, or 17 inches thick, or 35 pounds in weight, isn’t tied with string, and other obscurities. (For books, or other printed matter going Parcel Post, the maximum weight is 25 pounds.)  More at http://pe.usps.com/cpim/ftp/manuals/dmm300/101.pdf

The non-machinable penalty for inter-BMC/AF rates  is $3.89. 
Within an BMC/ASF, the non-machinable penalty is $2.87

5. If INTER (between BMCs/ASFs), look up the cost to that zone on the inter-BMC/ASF table below, on either the machinable or non-machinable side.

6. If  INTRA, here are the costs to Zone 5 for packages from 1 to 10 lbs:

  1. $6.83
  2. 7.59
  3. 8.33
  4. 9.00
  5. 9.63
  6. 10.19
  7. 10.73
  8. 11.21
  9. 11.66
  10. 12.08

The whole table starts on page 20 here:
http://pe.usps.gov/cpim/ftp/manuals/dmm300/ratesandfees.pdf 

For comparison, the inter BMC/ASF prices for the same weights range from $8 to $20. 
(These are non-machinable rates.)  

BMC/ASF CITY THAT SERVES YOU

glossary: 

BMC = Bulk Mail Center 

ASF = Auxiliary Service Facility    

For more postal abbreviations, acronyms and a USPS  technical term glossary, see  http://www.listsbank.com/postal_terms.htm    

BMCs (Bulk Mail Centers) in Zip code-order

New Jersey 
005, 068-079, 085-098, 100-119, 124-127

Springfield
010-067, 120-123, 128, 129

Philadelphia
080-084, 137-139, 169-199

Pittsburgh
150-168, 260-266, 439-447

Washington DC
200-212, 214-239, 244, 254, 267, 268

Greensboro NC
240-243, 245-249, 270-297, 376

Cincinnati
250-253, 255-259, 400-418, 421, 422, 425-427, 430-433, 437, 438, 448-462, 469-474

Atlanta
298, 300-312, 317-319, 350-352, 354-368, 373, 374, 377-379, 398, 399.

Jacksonville
299, 313-316, 320-342, 344, 346, 347, 349.

Memphis
369-372, 375, 380-397, 700, 701, 703-705, 707, 708, 713, 714, 716, 717, 719-729

St. Louis
420, 423, 424, 475-479, 614-620, 622-631, 633-639

Detroit
434-436, 465-468, 480-497

Chicago
463, 464, 530-532, 534, 535, 537-539, 600-611, 613

Minneapolis/St. Paul
498, 499, 540-551, 553-564, 566

Des Moines
500-516, 520-528, 612, 680, 681, 683-689

Kansas City
640, 641, 644-658, 660-662, 664-679, 739

Denver
690-693, 800-816, 820, 822-831, 856, 857

Dallas
706, 710-712, 718, 733, 747, 750-799, 880, 885

Seattle
835, 838, 970-978, 980-986, 988-994

Los Angeles
889-891, 893, 900-908, 910-928, 930-935

San Francisco
894, 895, 897, 936-966

ASFs (Auxiliary Service Facilities)  in Zip code order  
Buffalo
130-136, 140-149

Fargo ND
565, 567, 580-588

Sioux Falls SD
570-577

Billings MT
590-599, 821

Oklahoma City
730, 731, 734-738, 740, 741, 743-746, 748, 749

Salt Lake City
832-834, 836, 837, 840-847, 898, 979

Phoenix
850, 852, 853, 855, 859, 860, 863, 864

Albuquerque
865, 870-875, 877-879, 881-884

Other ASF
Puerto Rico
006-009

Hawaii
967-969

Alaska
995-999  

Inter-BMC/ASF PARCEL POST CHARGES by Zone

Parcel Post rates for INTER BMC/ASF destinations