Name: USPS changes rules: What it means for your bills, ballots and taxes
Uploaded: 2026-01-01T03:13:00.967Z
Duration: 2 min 54 s
Description: USPS changes postmark rules: What it means for your bills, ballots and taxes

USPS changes postmark rules: What it means for your bills, ballots and taxes

Utah

The United States Postal Service has implemented changes to how postmarks are handled, particularly affecting mail deposited in blue collection boxes. This has raised concerns among Utah residents about the impact on bill payments, election ballots, and tax filings. Utility companies such as Rocky Mountain Power continue to accept mailed payments, but customers are encouraged to verify current policies directly.

For elections, a recent Utah law now requires ballots to be received by election officials rather than just postmarked by election day, making USPS postmark changes less relevant for voters in the state. However, for tax filings, the postmark date remains critical under federal law, and tax professionals recommend mailing documents well before deadlines or requesting a manual hand-stamped postmark at local post offices.

USPS changes rules: What it means for your bills, ballots and taxes

The United States Postal Service is changing the way it deals with postmarks, how you go and turn your mail into these blue boxes. It's got a lot of people asking questions, including Nancy. She wrote to us saying in part, people can't depend on dropping off anymore in blue boxes and expect the date you dropped it off will be the time stamp. She goes on to say, please report this. I'm sure many are not aware. Well, Nancy, thanks so much for reaching out to us. We appreciate it. And we know you and a lot of other Utahns have questions about postmarks, so we wanted to try and answer some of those, starting with Utah's biggest utility, Rocky Mountain Power. It's estimated that around 7% of Americans still pay bills with checks, but in some places that number might be much higher. When we reached out to the largest utility in Utah, Rocky Mountain Power, a representative couldn't give us a direct answer on their policy, just that details would be on their website. When checking, they do still accept mailed in forms of payment. And when asked about customers and what they should do, we were told they should reach directly out to Rocky Mountain Power's 24-7 customer service for specific questions about their bills. So, that probably is a best practice. If you are still mailing in those checks to utility companies, whether it's trash, sewage, gas, or of course, water. The next place people are seeing their impacts across the country when they go to these blue boxes is in their elections for their ballots. But thanks to a recently passed law here in Utah, that won't impact us much. Part of that bill changed us from being a postmark state. That is no longer law of the land. We now need to have ballots in hand. Lanie Chapman is the Salt Lake County clerk, and she walked us through the change that's already impacted mail-in voting. USPS changing what their postmark means is pretty benign, pretty irrelevant when it comes to election administration. But if you do wait until election day, don't put it in one of those blue boxes. Instead, put it in one of these ballot drop boxes. From the day that you receive it until 8 p.m. on election night. Finally, tomorrow being 2026, it's the start of tax season. You know that dreaded time of year, right? Well, taxes do matter for postmarks. The National Society of Tax Professionals did put out a statement saying in part, this change in the USPS process will potentially have significant impact on tax filings. U.S. Code 7502 specifically relies upon the postmark date if you do have those time-sensitive pieces of mail. Best bet, get them in way ahead of the deadline. You can also ask a local post office to manually hand-stamp that postmark. Nancy, I hope this answered some of your questions as well as those other Utahns out there that saw this news and were concerned. Spencer Joseph, FOX 13 News, Utah.

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