The United States Postal Service announced on Wednesday, Feb 6th, 2013 that it would no longer deliver mail letters on Saturdays beginning in August 2013. Parcels will continue to receive six day a week service.
The USPS indicated this was a reflection of the shipping needs of their customers and probably more importantly...represents a $2 billion dollar savings annually.
Check out this PDF for more information. I for one will be glad to wait tail Monday to get my bills!!
February 06, 2013
Release No. 13-019
WASHINGTON — The United States Postal Service announced plans today to transition to a new delivery schedule during the week of Aug. 5, 2013 that includes package delivery Monday through Saturday, and mail delivery Monday through Friday. The Postal Service expects to generate cost savings of approximately $2 billion annually, once the plan is fully implemented.
“The Postal Service is advancing an important new approach to delivery that reflects the strong growth of our package business and responds to the financial realities resulting from America’s changing mailing habits,” said Patrick R. Donahoe, Postmaster General and CEO. “We developed this approach by working with our customers to understand their delivery needs and by identifying creative ways to generate significant cost savings.”
Over the past several years, the Postal Service has advocated shifting to a five-day delivery schedule for mail and packages. However, recent strong growth in package delivery (14 percent volume increase since 2010) and projections of continued strong package growth throughout the coming decade led to the revised approach to maintain package delivery six days per week.
“Our customers see strong value in the national delivery platform we provide and maintaining a six-day delivery schedule for packages is an important part of that platform,” said Donahoe. “As consumers increasingly use and rely on delivery services — especially due to the rise of e-commerce — we can play an increasingly vital role as a delivery provider of choice, and as a driver of growth opportunities for America’s businesses.”
Once implemented during August of 2013, mail delivery to street addresses will occur Monday through Friday. Packages will continue to be delivered six days per week. Mail addressed to PO Boxes will continue to be delivered on Saturdays. Post Offices currently open on Saturdays will remain open on Saturdays.
Market research conducted by the Postal Service and independent research by major news organizations indicate that nearly seven out of ten Americans (70 percent) supported the switch to five-day delivery as a way for the Postal Service to reduce costs in its effort to return the organization to financial stability.¹ Support for this approach will likely be even higher since the Postal Service plans to maintain six-day package delivery.
The Postal Service is making the announcement today, more than six months in advance of implementing five-day mail delivery schedule, to give residential and business customers time to plan and adjust. The Postal Service plans to publish specific guidance in the near future for residential and business customers about its new delivery schedule.
Given the ongoing financial challenges, the Postal Service Board of Governors last month directed postal management to accelerate the restructuring of Postal Service operations in order to strengthen Postal Service finances.
“The American public understands the financial challenges of the Postal Service and supports these steps as a responsible and reasonable approach to improving our financial situation,” said Donahoe. “The Postal Service has a responsibility to take the steps necessary to return to long-term financial stability and ensure the continued affordability of the U.S. Mail.”
The operational plan for the new delivery schedule anticipates a combination of employee reassignment and attrition and is expected to achieve cost savings of approximately $2 billion annually when fully implemented.
The Postal Service is currently implementing major restructuring throughout its retail, delivery and mail processing operations. Since 2006, the Postal Service has reduced its annual cost base by approximately $15 billion, reduced the size of its career workforce by 193,000 or 28 percent, and has consolidated more than 200 mail processing locations. During these unprecedented initiatives, the Postal Service continued to deliver record high levels of service to its customers.
While the change in the delivery schedule announced today is one of the actions needed to restore the financial health of the Postal Service, legislative change is urgently needed to address matters outside the Postal Service’s control. The Postal Service continues to seek legislation to provide it with greater flexibility to control costs and generate new revenue and encourages the 113th Congress to make postal reform legislation an urgent priority.
I don't believe for one moment that the USPS will suspend Saturday delivery of first class mail in August (although I believe they should go to home delivery 3 days a week (either m w f for some addresses and then tu th s for the remainder). (you could cut the workforce in half.....have you really looked at what comes into your mailbox lately - I could live with delivery once a month frankly)
Grant that with this announcement the USPS clearly states that parcels (yes even your prescriptions with your 90 day supply of drugs) are not affected at all by this decision and I even heard a conversation in DC about delivering parcels 7 days a week!
An elimination of one of the six delivery days for first and third class means then one sixth of the USPS APWU force, 330,000 strong, logically sends 55,000 people to the unemployment office (or forced to retire, in order to gan the savings the USPS says will come with this decision.
Even if the number was 10% of that, the White House will not be responsible for that many lay offs, and the USPS reports to the Executive branch.
What the PMG wants (and needs) is relief from the retiree health prefunding requirement as written, and a recalculation of the number of employees for which it has to pay workmen's comp for.
If he can get that from Congress then the USPS runs in the black.
Keep in mind that when the laws were originally crafted there was no problem with either funding requirement and the $ to pay those were in the formula to determine the price of postage we have been paying. But as we know the Internet happened, first class declined, the number of people needed to deliver mail was reduced and so on.
Ergo, the law needs to be fixed.
Congress was distracted with the election last year and nothing was done to address the problem.
This year the fiscal cliff, the attack in Bengazzi, the control of guns, immigration, the budget dispute, the sequestration and so on distract Congress and the USPS can't get anyone on The Hill to pay attention to fixing the USPS budget issues.
What happened this past week was a salvo fired across the bow of the sitting Congress to get off their butts and do something. In order to get their attention he did something very dramatic which got lots of air and print time. The PMG got the noise level up and some on The Hill are now paying attention. I don't believe the PMG has the legal authority to do what he did (but I'm not a lawyer). I think he needs a legislative change to one sentence of law and also the approval of the Postal Regulatory Commission which i do not believe they have.
I have spent lots of time in DC around postal issues and I have become very cynical of the process and the theater that happens to get things done. It's my humble opinion that what we saw yesterday was Kabuki theatre being played to the hilt.
I do believe the PMG should be allowed to close the unproductive post offices, at will. Currently it's an impossible and politically charged issue to do so. It's prudent business to close facilities that because of changing demographics, and no longer make logical sense to keep open. The Congress interferes with any closure. I think the USPS should price its business like any other business to cover its costs and have a reserve. That's prudent business. The Congress interferes with rate setting and price changes. There are incredible lobbys in DC that stand in the way of this.
The USPS should be free to modify its service standards and network to best serve the public and to use modern technology. The Congress pushes back fearing a plant closure or layoffs in thier districts.
It's the people we sent to Washington (both sides of the aisle) that are the problem and the USPS is just not a priority for any of them. There is no glamour or accolades for someone working on Postal issues when other topics will get you five minutes of prime time air play. And the press vilify the elect when they put forth proposals because the APWU and the Lobbys dont want any pain for their constituents.
Its a microcosm of how we currently run and fund our government.
So the USPS will run out of cash this year, and the Congress can just raise the borrowing limit of the USPS to pay their bills.
Just one mans opinion, I could be wrong.
Posted by: Jerry Hempstead | February 10, 2013 at 10:41 AM