Your ballot or other mail may not get postmarked by USPS the day it’s dropped off

photograph of a USPS mailbox.
In response to U.S. Postal Service changes, California state officials are urging mail-in voters for a special election on congressional redistricting to return their ballots before Election Day to help ensure their ballots get postmarked by the deadline. Here, a post office in Montclair, Calif., is seen last year. Mario Tama/Getty Images

By Hansi Lo Wang – NPR

(NPR) Changes at the U.S. Postal Service are forcing people who rely on postmarks when voting, filing taxes or mailing legal documents to be extra careful when cutting it close to deadlines.

Postmarks include the dates that USPS stamps on envelopes, and those are often used to determine whether a piece of first-class mail was sent on time.

But the Postal Service has proposed revising its mailing standards to…

More from our Newsroom