Postal Service Seeks Five-Day Delivery by Early 2011

Bloomberg
Postal Service Seeks Five-Day Delivery by Early 2011 (Update2)
March 29, 2010, 4:13 PM EDT
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By Angela Greiling Keane

March 29 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Postal Service would cut Saturday mail delivery starting in the first half of 2011 under a plan the agency will give its regulator tomorrow.

The Postal Service, which forecasts a $238 billion budget deficit by 2020, says it would save about $3.3 billion in the first year from eliminating deliveries on one day and $5.1 billion a year by 2020.

“Given the fact that we’re facing such a huge deficit, we’d like to move as quickly as possible,” Postmaster General John Potter told reporters today in Washington.

The Postal Service will file its five-day delivery proposal with the Postal Regulatory Commission in Washington. It is also seeking permission to scale back service from the Congress, which requires delivery to all U.S. addresses six days a week.

The agency proposes to keep open local offices on Saturdays and process and transport mail during the weekends after dropping deliveries to homes and businesses.

The Postal Service said the plan will eliminate the equivalent of 40,000 full-time jobs and would help it return to solvency as mail volumes erode because customers switch to electronic communication. The Postal Service also is seeking to expand its retail offerings, reduce its workforce through attrition and change a requirement that it pre-fund its retiree health care costs.

The commission has 90 days to review the proposal and issue a non-binding opinion, Potter said. “As with all actions by the Postal Regulatory Commission, we give them great consideration,” he said.

Immediate Needs Ignored

Commission Chairman Ruth Goldway faulted the Postal Service for ignoring short-term financial needs and possible remedies in writing a “thoughtful and comprehensive” report.

“It does not address the immediate crisis, nor what the Postal Service might reasonably be expected to do to avoid insolvency by the beginning of FY 2011 without congressional intervention,” Goldway wrote today in the introduction to an annual report on Postal Service performance.

The National Association of Letter Carriers, representing employees who deliver mail in cities, called cutting Saturday delivery “risky and counterproductive.”

“The Postal Service should stand down on this reckless drive to end Saturday delivery,” association President Fredric V. Rolando said today in a statement.

A survey conducted in August for the Postal Service by Maritz Research in St. Louis found 68 percent of 2,200 residential and small-business customers favored five-day delivery, and more than half the businesses said Saturday delivery “is unimportant.”

 

this is ridiculous. switch it to two days a week. privatize it. put a bullet in it. who cares? the only things i have to mail still are things i mail to the government - which irritates me to no end they can't get online with everybody else...

 

fred smith is laughing his ass off now...

http://www.businessweek.com/news/20...mith-among-ceos-who-give-economic-advice.html

 

I'm all for cutting it from 6 to 3 days a week if we can unload 50% fo the postal employees as well.

 

I agree completely. MWF is all that is needed for residential delivery. Put a stake in it.

 

That should cut another 40k postal employees at least.

Imagine all these employees going "postal" at once. :eek:

 

Yeah. A democratic federal government is going to cut union jobs - cut a giant federal union in half! LOL.

Maybe they'll also cut spending and taxes while they are at it.

 

If they cut all those jobs who is going to sit behind the counter in the post office doing nothing while the line goes out the front door?

Can we please go back to cutting taxes and spending like W?

 

They'll "lay off" postal workers by sending them to the Job Bank. Then they'll REALLY "get paid for doing nothing".

 

Why does the USPS lose money?
I am enrolling my son in a school-sponsored program. The program only accepts checks, it is based in the same town as we live, and the program does not keep regular hours, so the check must be mailed. The check will enter the mailbox, be driven to the city post office, then driven to the regional office, 20 miles away, returned to the city office, then driven to the final destination, which is approx. 300 yards from the city post office.
All for .44 cents.