Postage Due stamps are designed to pay additional postage on mail with insufficient postage. If a letter cost 60 cents to mail and only 40 cents in postage was placed on the letter, 20 cents is missing or due. France issued the first Postage Due stamp in 1859. Since then almost every country has issued Postage Due stamps sometime in the past. Today, these stamps are rarely seen on pieces of mail. Like airmail stamps, there are many postage due stamps and knowing how to identify the term in a foreign language is a valuable skill. Note the different languages for these postage due stamps.