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Return to Article: Public mandates, market pressures squeeze Postal Service

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  A 5 day work week for the letter carrier would greatly reduce he cost for the postal service. With decreasing volumes this should not impact operations on mondays by much. Carriers are currently scrambling for something to do in the mornings from Thrs to Sat because of the light volumes. The postal service could still keep its processing operations runing to transport the mail throughout the country and international. As for to many postal offices, well its nice to have a branch close to home, I dont hear anyone complaning about to many Mcdonalds or 7/11's What the postal service could do in the case of smaller offices would be to operate them as stations of a larger facility therefore eliminating a office head at each facility this would reduce the overall higher paid mamagement. Just some thoughts.

  RAT Posted January 21, 2009 1:25 PM
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  I have 3 post offices within a 5 mile radius of my house. Yet I don't see a mailbox within that radius (besides the one outside the POs) until I drive into the next township. Would it not be frugile to place more mailboxes and less offices?

  Carmen Lindstrom Posted March 7, 2008 9:23 AM
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  I agree with A.Young, consolidating nearby post offices is common sense. An example of an extreme case: In the town (its not really big enough to be called a town)of Eastham, on Cape Cod, 2 post offices are almost directly across the street from each other! In the neighboring little "town" of Wellfleet,also on the Cape, there's a relatively new large post office with the small older facility still in operation, not a mile away! For 6 months out of every year the population goes way down. Go figure why 4 post office facilities are needed within a 10 mile stretch of Rt.6!

  Sandra Arms Posted March 7, 2008 9:11 AM
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  If the post office would get rid of Saturday delivery, they would save one six of their carrier budget and operational cost. Do it now or do it later. They really have no choice.

  Mailmanboss Posted March 7, 2008 8:19 AM
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  In respond to A. Young's question, the Postal Service has tried to close or consolidate post offices and distribution centers in the past. However, Congress always stops when constituents complain about lost services or lost jobs.

  Mike Castro Posted March 6, 2008 6:41 PM
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  Jon: See third paragraph: "In the face of competition from private carriers and e-mail, the Postal Service cannot keep providing universal service while hamstrung by limits on its control over prices and labor costs."

  Larry Posted March 6, 2008 3:50 PM
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  1 place to start is closing 25% of the post offices. I'VE used rural locations that refused to take credit cards for payment, closed 2-3 hours for lunch etc. PS has always been a jobs program that needs to vastly reform

  dan ketter Posted March 6, 2008 3:03 PM
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  Both the headline and lead sentence refer to "Public mandates" as the problem. So what the hell are they?

  Jon Posted March 6, 2008 2:55 PM
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  I'm curious why the Postal Service can't close small unproductive offices that are within 5 to 10 miles of another Post Office. I'm sure there would be a savings in building costs as well as personnel and transportation.

  A Young Posted March 6, 2008 2:51 PM
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  Postal Service is extremely important older and poorer Americans who either can't afford computers or are not savvy enough to use them. But keeping rates low for all that commercial "junk mail" is rediculous. Keep rates low for private mail while increaseing the price for commercial junk mail should eliminate some of the scamming of elders, reduce the amount of trash that accumulates across our country or increase significantly the revenue of the USPS.

  Donna Shands Posted March 6, 2008 1:36 PM
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  The union is killing the postal service. Why do we need mail delivered six days a week? Four days is plenty. Remember the United Garment Workers Union? I can still remember the song from the commercials; the postal service's days are numbered unless Congress intervenes to mandate how they will save money.

  nathan wolfson Posted March 6, 2008 1:34 PM
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  I believe that the postal service should make this dire information available to the craft employees so they will be informed about our tremendous need to become more efficient in our business. This is a situation that requires all of us (U.S. Postal Employees)to consider what is really important when it comes to contract negotiations with the employee's unions.1 ounce of prevention IS WORTH a pound of cure.

  Kelvin V. Ward Posted March 6, 2008 12:25 PM
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  The Postal Service could save substancial money by offering an early out to the employees still covered under the old Civil Service Retirement Program. This retirement system is more costly to the postal service than FERS. These employees are among the highest paid employees and could be replaced with lower waged employees, since wages are the postal service's largest expense.

  Bena The'ir Posted March 6, 2008 8:20 AM
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  I say this as a strong union man. The service in most post offices is awful, they are open a limited time and the employees are not happy to see you. Too much protection and poor customer service. Make them sweat a bit. They need some contracting out to light a fire under them.

  Wise Old Owl Posted March 6, 2008 8:15 AM