U.S. postal keeps going down hill.

[moparedtn]

There's certainly a lot of issues with the USPS - but there's just as many with other carriers too, to be fair.
Disclaimer - I am the son of a retired higher-level USPS fella (my dad), who worked most of his career
for them in their payroll department and was in on the ground floor of their computerization programs
in the 60's.
Such a feat, afforded a rural boy in TN at his age back in the early 60's, could not happen again today -
it's quite a story, one I'm sure I've written about before, but I digress.
All of that to say, I have a bit more of a working knowledge of the organization by most - not out of any
curiosity but because I grew up his son, so...

USPS is not a business to make profit. It is a government organization designed to move mail. Its largely operated by imperfect people like me and you. If they f*%#’d up as often as I do we’d be in real trouble.

Well, yes and no - it's not a "government organization", but is technically is an independent agency of the executive branch, meaning
it is operated like a private business under strict guidelines outlined in its' "charter" as defined by law.
Its' service as the countries' only letter carrier was deemed vital to the country many decades ago and as such, it has a
monopoly on that - but has to directly compete with other package carriers in that market, too (which it does quite well, actually).

Some years it shows a profit - others it doesn't. Good point on it being all about the humans, however.
Seems to me since the whole Covid thing that NO service company, NO manufacturer....hell NO pizza joint has come back to
the level of services they provided prior to that whole charade....

The USPS losses billions of dollars per year. And some government genius decided they should deliver on Sunday.

Not always; see above - but here's some stats for you:
As of 2021, the USPS operates 31,330 post offices and locations in the U.S., and delivers 128.8 billion pieces of mail annually
to 163 million delivery points (like your house and mine) (as of 2022)!!!
Staggering numbers - and they have to do so for uniform prices no matter where within the borders and territories of the USA
they serve, which is everywhere....
USPS delivers mail and packages Monday through Saturday as required by the Postal Act of 2022; on Sundays only Priority Express and packages for Amazon.com are delivered.

Yes, they also deliver for other carriers - in my area, they do double duty for FedEx a lot, for example.

Nothing further than this ^ required. This pretty much says it all when it comes to ANYTHING government.

Could they do better than they do? Sure, always room for improvement...
Unions haven't helped things, management that doesn't feel the direct sting of an overseeing stockholder-driven
base don't help either - but I'd say, knowing the numbers, what they do is a freaking Herculean task...
and they do it every day, weather be damned.

Lookit - wherever you are, whoever your local service folks are and whatever company they work for, they're ALL
variables - you can't attribute a careless or lazy employee in AZ (for example) to the entire organization they work
for everywhere, after all, right?
We've all got bitchin' to do about this or that company, which really boils down to this or that employee when you
get right down to it (in my case, I've had it so much with FedEx that the local franchise now knows me to be someone
who might run his *** off my property at gunpoint next time I see 'em).

What I'm saying is it ain't the company - it ain't the government - it boils down to people, individuals - and decent ones
of those critters are getting harder and harder to come by in these times we find ourselves in.

 

[GetX'd]

There's certainly a lot of issues with the USPS - but there's just as many with other carriers too, to be fair.
Disclaimer - I am the son of a retired higher-level USPS fella (my dad), who worked most of his career
for them in their payroll department and was in on the ground floor of their computerization programs
in the 60's.
Such a feat, afforded a rural boy in TN at his age back in the early 60's, could not happen again today -
it's quite a story, one I'm sure I've written about before, but I digress.
All of that to say, I have a bit more of a working knowledge of the organization by most - not out of any
curiosity but because I grew up his son, so...

Well, yes and no - it's not a "government organization", but is technically is an independent agency of the executive branch, meaning
it is operated like a private business under strict guidelines outlined in its' "charter" as defined by law.
Its' service as the countries' only letter carrier was deemed vital to the country many decades ago and as such, it has a
monopoly on that - but has to directly compete with other package carriers in that market, too (which it does quite well, actually).

Some years it shows a profit - others it doesn't. Good point on it being all about the humans, however.
Seems to me since the whole Covid thing that NO service company, NO manufacturer....hell NO pizza joint has come back to
the level of services they provided prior to that whole charade....

Not always; see above - but here's some stats for you:
As of 2021, the USPS operates 31,330 post offices and locations in the U.S., and delivers 128.8 billion pieces of mail annually
to 163 million delivery points (like your house and mine) (as of 2022)!!!
Staggering numbers - and they have to do so for uniform prices no matter where within the borders and territories of the USA
they serve, which is everywhere....
USPS delivers mail and packages Monday through Saturday as required by the Postal Act of 2022; on Sundays only Priority Express and packages for Amazon.com are delivered.

Yes, they also deliver for other carriers - in my area, they do double duty for FedEx a lot, for example.


Could they do better than they do? Sure, always room for improvement...
Unions haven't helped things, management that doesn't feel the direct sting of an overseeing stockholder-driven
base don't help either - but I'd say, knowing the numbers, what they do is a freaking Herculean task...
and they do it every day, weather be damned.

Lookit - wherever you are, whoever your local service folks are and whatever company they work for, they're ALL
variables - you can't attribute a careless or lazy employee in AZ (for example) to the entire organization they work
for everywhere, after all, right?
We've all got bitchin' to do about this or that company, which really boils down to this or that employee when you
get right down to it (in my case, I've had it so much with FedEx that the local franchise now knows me to be someone
who might run his *** off my property at gunpoint next time I see 'em).

What I'm saying is it ain't the company - it ain't the government - it boils down to people, individuals - and decent ones
of those critters are getting harder and harder to come by in these times we find ourselves in.

Maybe Ed - But what do you have to say about post #17?

 

[moparedtn]

Maybe Ed - But what do you have to say about post #17?

What part specifically?

 

[GetX'd]

What part specifically?

The part about the slush fund and 75;yrs of funding for bennies

 

[moparedtn]

The part about the slush fund and 75;yrs of funding for bennies

What would you like me to say?
I've already acknowledged the harm the unions have done to the company - in this case you refer to,
whatever amount the company is required to keep in a fund for employee retirement/benefits is mandated
as part of the latest collective bargaining agreement in force nowadays.

"Slush funds"? Well, the budget of the company is overseen by federal overlords, although I cannot comment
as to any knowledge of their being able to "raid" monies - like the feds do to the Social Security fund, for
example - which IS directly controlled by Congress.

 

[DeltaV]

The second 'S' in USPS does not stand for 'Service'. It stands for something else.

 

[Edward Zeliesko]

my post office in pgh, nasty clerks they dont take cash, credit cards only, sometime they dont have stamps ?? why even be in business ???

 

[Rick62]

Until the late 70's most big companies had defined benefit retirement programs. Much like what government employees have today. Sometime in the seventies, the government passed an accounting rule that required public companies to project the impact of retirement costs in long range future projections. It became apparent that defined benefit retirement programs were not sustainable. As a result almost all public companies converted to 401K programs. Cities, counties, states and the Federal government had the same problem. But, instead of making the change to 401Ks our politicians did what politicians do and kicked the can down the road. Now the chickens are coming home to roost. So, should the cost of retirement not be included in the operating cost of the USPS? If not, where should that cost go?

 

[Histoy]

I live in Iowa and exchange Christmas cards with friends in Kentucky. They live in 2 different towns, but both of them have their mail routed through Cincinnati Ohio, where they are post marked. I was surprised when I didn't receive cards from them this year. I finally got their cards, but it took 5 1/2 weeks for them to arrive. They were post marked 2 days apart and the second card arrived 2 days after the first one. That's pathetic service!

 

[MoparRobTX]

I dropped a trade in phone to the post office last week with a prepaid label and the tracking number still doesn't even register that it shipped. It was a $1000 trade in promo that I'm sure I will be on the hook for if AT&T doesn't get it. You cant even file anything until a week has passed.

 

[GetX'd]

Until the late 70's most big companies had defined benefit retirement programs. Much like what government employees have today. Sometime in the seventies, the government passed an accounting rule that required public companies to project the impact of retirement costs in long range future projections. It became apparent that defined benefit retirement programs were not sustainable. As a result almost all public companies converted to 401K programs. Cities, counties, states and the Federal government had the same problem. But, instead of making the change to 401Ks our politicians did what politicians do and kicked the can down the road. Now the chickens are coming home to roost. So, should the cost of retirement not be included in the operating cost of the USPS? If not, where should that cost go?

How about we the people just keep paying the bills and shut up about it …. Lol