No Improvements in Delivery Yet from DeJoy’s USPS Plan
Indeed, everything Postmaster DeJoy has done has slowed the USPS even more . . .
USPS plans rural slowdown after election to cut costs, The Washington Post (archive.ph)
Top U.S. Postal Service officials are considering plans to allow slower mail delivery in the coming months for long-distance and rural service to cut costs at the financially troubled agency — but not until after the election.
The changes would give customers within 50 miles of the Postal Service’s largest processing facilities faster delivery service, which accounts for the vast majority of mail and packages, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy told The Washington Post. But the agency cannot afford to maintain the same model for deliveries into far-flung areas, he said. That could add an additional day to current delivery timetables.
“At the end of the day, I think some portion of the mail showing up 12 hours later, I think it’s a price that had to be paid for letting this place be neglected,” DeJoy said. “You look around every other country, [delivery] is longer, it’s much more expensive. We’re trying to save the Postal Service — not figuratively, not to advocate for something. We’re trying to literally save the Postal Service.”
DeJoy said the new policy would not be implemented until after November’s elections. The Postal Service filed plans Thursday with its regulator to hold public hearings to solicit feedback on the proposed changes.
Four years ago, similar cost-cutting moves prompted litigation over fears voting would be disrupted. Ultimately, the agency helped nearly half of all 2020 voters request or cast ballots by mail, according to the University of Florida’s U.S. Elections Project.
In the plans under discussion, the Postal Service would allow mail and packages to sit at certain facilities for an extra day instead of transporting them immediately for processing and delivery, DeJoy said. That would extend acceptable delivery times for mail traveling longer distances.
Pilots of the policy have been in place in certain areas, mostly rural, for months.
The new delivery standards require the approval of the agency’s nine-member governing board. They also must be reviewed by the Postal Regulatory Commission, though the panel’s recommendation is nonbinding.
The Postal Service is still reeling from the aftermath of mail slowdowns around the 2020 election. In a drive to cut costs and improve operations, DeJoy-led initiatives snarled mail processing nationwide, with changes that experts say jeopardized ballot access for tens of millions of Americans.
The Postal Service faced a bevy of lawsuits over the 2020 policies and ultimately took “extraordinary measures” that saw nearly 98 percent of ballots delivered from voters to election officials within three days. The agency has generally won praise for its handling of ballots in numerous elections since.
“The Postal Service, especially as it leads up to Election Day, really does go to extraordinary measures to try to make sure that every voter who’s mailed their ballot on time, that it gets delivered so it can be counted and that their voices are heard,” said Tammy Patrick, who leads the National Association of Election Officials. “But when we shift that ballot return or that mail volume into the final days, it presents more pressure on the Postal Service to deliver not only within their delivery standards, but [faster than] their delivery standards.
The Postal Service has faced difficulty in meeting those standards in recent months. The agency delivered 83.4 percent of first-class mail on time the week of Aug. 12, according to postal data firm SnailWorks. The agency’s target is 95 percent on time.
Across the country, though, the Postal Service is exceeding the 95 percent target when delivering items with a one-day grace period, according to the agency’s online data dashboard.
Allowing marginally slower service to rural areas, which often drag down on-time rates, could improve the agency’s delivery metrics, experts say.
DeJoy and the board of governors have already eased the Postal Service’s goals in recent years. Until 2021, the agency aimed to deliver all first-class mail in at most three days. DeJoy extended that in 2021 as part of his 10-year cost-cutting plan to up to five days. The agency has also raised the price of first-class postage by 33 percent in the past four years.
“Any effort to degrade service while raising prices is a recipe for a death spiral at the Postal Service,” Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), a leading DeJoy critic, said in a statement. “This is the second time Postmaster General DeJoy has proposed lower service standards. He might as well announce a return to delivering mail by horse and buggy.”
The GOP-controlled House Appropriations Committee also rebuked parts of DeJoy’s 10-year plan, writing that it was “deeply concerned about the potential negative impacts on mail service to the American people, customer satisfaction, and cost overruns.”
DeJoy in an interview shot back that lawmakers were “out of their league” with their critiques of the agency.
“They don’t understand the business. Nobody knows what it takes to compete with FedEx and UPS and drives billions of dollars of cost out of here that’s in the critique business. Even though it’s Congress, they don’t know.”
The price and delivery changes have done little to stabilize the Postal Service’s finances. The agency is on pace to lose more than $7 billion in the 2024 fiscal year, and it lost $6.5 billion in fiscal 2023. In 2022, Congress passed a $107 billion plan to stabilize the mail service’s balance sheet after worries during the pandemic that it could not survive another financial shock.
The agency’s “universal service obligation” — its requirement to serve rural areas with low-margin products even at a financial loss — has driven much of the financial struggles. Its private-sector competitors, such as FedEx, UPS and Amazon, often take advantage of that mandatory service to avoid delivering to unprofitable locations. (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns The Post.)
For parcels, the practice does make the Postal Service money, but it still saddles the agency with the least-lucrative routes while its competitors build out their distribution network in the most attractive areas. As postal delivery service slows, some stakeholders worry it could drive business away from the mail agency.
Maybe nobody knows what it takes to compete with FedEx and UPS, but the Post Office did a very good job of competition before DeJoy took over. Small package delivery half way across the country was a day sooner and just about 1/3 the price. It may have been less competitive from an urban sender, or to a recipient within the local metro area, but I can still remember when mail deposited by 9 AM would be delivered to local zip codes the same day.
When I moved here, in town deliveries never left the post office, they went from the collection box to the carriers sorting area. Now that is a two or three day delivery, depending on how many outbound trucks you miss. For that matter, you could practically set your watch by the postman. Mail between 10 and 10:15 every day. It could even include something mailed early that morning.
All the improvements we have had in the last 30 years have meant that more mail never shows up and what does show up takes 2 or 3 or 4 days longer than it did. I really need to have someone explain to me how that can be.
by design?
Jane:
For one thing, the nation is more populated than 30 years ago. It doesn’t mean deliveries can not happen on a timely basis. A ways back, Senator Collins insisted the USPS retirement be fully funded. Such was passed in both legislative bodies. It was then the USPS started to run deficits.
The article says that the USPS is the last leg of delivery for FedX which is very true. There has been a push for the USPS to lower its costs for that last leg by such companies. This to make their shipping cost more competitive with the USPS. By no means should FedX be allowed lower costs from the USPS.
The improvements by DeJoy have led to degradation of the USPS, Biden and neither Harris do much to prevent it. His firing has to be done by the USPS Commission.
Just a gut feel, but possibly very few qualified people would like to take over for DeJoy. It not so mysterious: Congress has told the USPS to significantly reduce go-forward pension obligations as a percentage of revenue. If you can’t move to a pension-less labor force, well you are desperate to reorganize to reduced pensioned labor inputs or grow revenue a lot, pretty much with the price lever, which Congress will get around to hating pretty quickly, too. Again this is my view, but the major Congressional input signal to USPS management is to cut labor. Not easy or pleasant.
Eric:
As soon as you say Labor, you are wrong. The infrastructure is the greatest cost. Congress must follow the dictates of the constitution which basically says we will deliver the mail everywhere by some means. Quit blaming Labor for a logisyics issues.
This is what happens when you get management involved in running just about anything. Quality goes down and costs go up. Dejoy took a hammer to a well oiled machine with no idea of how to put it back together. I assume his goal was to make the USPS so wretched and expensive that private companies like UPS and Fedex could compete.
maybe you should say when management involved in ruining everything it all goes bad fast!
Sabotaging Vote by Mail. Period …
Ten Bears:
Which is why they stopped the conversion before the previous election. There was fear the mail delivery after people voted would be delayed. Even though you mailed before an event, which is an action the same as voting, the battle would rage about it being late and these votes should not be considered as legitimate. Postmarks mean everything; however, prove you mailed at a post office before an election and the USPS screwed up.
Then what?