4 ms·

To be fair: the USPS is being rushed out the door via a legislative hit job. They've been required to accumulate a reserve of 75 years-worth of worker benefits

by roc 15y ago

To be fair: the USPS is being rushed out the door via a legislative hit job. They've been required to accumulate a reserve of 75 years-worth of worker benefits (retirement and healthcare) -- something I don't believe any other company or government service has to do -- and build up that reserve in 10 years, on their existing budget. So the speed of their decline is greatly exaggerated by this and not entirely reflective of the drop in utilization. Personally, I see no reason the USPS couldn't remain and remain as a useful service if they transitioned to being better at sending/tracking packages as opposed to letters. UPS and FedEx are great and all, but they've nowhere near the customer focus that the USPS has. And in many cases companies offering shipping services already leverage the USPS to deliver useful mail and packages -- it's a great service for them, because they can get the attention that the average citizen cannot. I think there's plenty of room to expand on what works for the USPS, maintaining a useful baseline service for Americans. All that said: yes, their marketing has been atrocious, embarrassing, unhelpful and utterly unnecessary lately.

timjahn 15y ago
I'm aware of the government requirements on USPS but I believe that's irrelevant. The USPS would still be in the decline it is today regardless of whether or not they had to stash away all that money today, 5 years from now, or never. It's simple: people don't use the mail as much as they used to. And that trend is only going to continue. People will never increase their use of the USPS. "UPS and FedEx are great and all, but they've nowhere near the customer focus that the USPS has." I must have a very different experience with the USPS then you. Any time I go to the post office (which now is maybe once every year or two), the employees are extremely disgruntled, not happy that you're there, and not very interested in helping you get what you need done. More importantly, though, in my experience, the USPS is horrible at its core job: transporting and delivering mail. They have "tracking" that doesn't actually track - it simply tells you the package has left the origin and arrived at the destination - nothing in between. Mail is consistently lost, delivered to the wrong address, or opened before delivery (by who knows). Again, this is my experience. I suspect it's not unique, but your mile probably varies.
- Anechoic 15y ago
  I'm aware of the government requirements on USPS but I believe that's irrelevant. The USPS would still be in the decline it is today regardless of whether or not they had to stash away all that money today, 5 years from now, or never. They would still be in decline, but they actually run an operating profit right now. If/as mail volume further declines they can cut & consolidate facilities to a point where they can still be reasonably profitable. Any time I go to the post office (which now is maybe once every year or two), the employees are extremely disgruntled, not happy that you're there, and not very interested in helping you get what you need done We all have anecdotes. My business uses USPS for shipping packages worldwide and I am a very happy customer of their services. I go to various Post Offices (01139, 06096, 01095, and 01803 among others, depending on my schedule and travel) 6 days a week to collect mail and ship packages. At this point the workers all know me very well, so it may be that my experiences are atypical, but I find them all to be extremely hardworking, friendly and willing to go the extra mile for me - for example, I mailed a letter once and didn't put enough postage on it. One of the postal workers put on the extra postage and left a note in my PO box asking me to reimburse her when I got a chance. But again, these are just anecdotes. However, even when I visit Post Offices I don't normally go to, I'm still largely happy with the services. The only complaint is that sometimes when a Post Office is very busy, I've had employees be curt with me, but in those circumstances I can understand why. They have "tracking" that doesn't actually track - it simply tells you the package has left the origin and arrived at the destination - nothing in between. Wholeheartedly agreed. They need to do better here. Mail is consistently lost, delivered to the wrong address, or opened before delivery (by who knows) I've shipped something like 2000 packages in the last 3 years to all 50 states and over 40 countries. I've had a grand total of two packages lost (and I'm pretty sure that only one of those two packages was actually lost and the other one was just a customer who wanted a free second item).
  - steauengeglase 15y ago
    I'll be happy to put on my tinfoil hat and tell you what I think is really going on. The USPS does a lot more than ship packages and letters. They are also the government's mass printer. That VA letter and social security check probably wasn't printed in a Virginia suburb, but at one of the regional USPS printing offices. They also handle very high security items, not just to you, but between government agencies under conditions that would make the warden of a maximum security prison blush. The term "going postal" isn't about some guy at your local post office flipping out over the number of people waiting to get their packages weighed, but about some guy who has spent decades wondering if the guy standing next to him is a postal inspector just itching to see him screw up. To put it another way, they offset a lot of other agencies costs (at least in overhead). I'm certainly not saying it would be better or worse if all of this were handled by the private sector, but I will say it would require a lot of restructuring and make someone a huge pile of cash. Still, it is going to happen sooner or later. Politically it is just too sweet.
patio11 15y ago
Defenders of the Post Office like to say this, but it is at odds with reality. The prefunding requirement only requires them to have the NPV value of future payments for everyone who currently or formerly works for them. This is how everyone should accumulate pensions: the alternative is an accounting gimmick in which you promise unsustainable future payments today and then make yourself scarce (or ask for the taxpayer to clean up your mess) when they come due tomorrow. (The minimum requirement for all employers is that they implement pay-as-you-go, which means that someone's pension should be fully funded at the point where they start drawing benefits. This means that, if you hypothetically have 100k employees who are 5 years from retirement, you can report a pension fund with no assets as fully funded today. This gives you five years to look under the seat cushions for the $25 billion you need to come up with to avoid insolvency. Congress has decided to not let the Post Office implement pay-as-you-go because Congress anticipates that the Post Office will, if allowed to do that, report "The Post Office is profitable on its own revenues and receives no support from the federal government" reliably every year until their pension fund implodes with a 13 figure uncovered liability.) They're separately required to produce accounting projections for the next 75 years, but those don't have a funding mandate attached to them. http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Sections/News_And_Analysis/_Blogs/NetNet/__DAILY_POSTS/CRSmemo_postal_rhb.pdf http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Sections/News_And_Analysis/... The part most relevant to the discussion is the paragraphs surrounding: "Under current law, PAEA (P.L. 109-435) requires USPS to determine the actuarial present value of future retiree health payments for current or former employees and to amortize that liability over a 40 year period."
- roc 15y ago
  > "This is how everyone should accumulate pensions" Probably. Yet this is the only group that is required to. And they've been required to make up the difference under a very short timeframe. Should every pension fund be given only 10 years to correct the situation? > "Congress anticipates that the Post Office will, if allowed to do that, report "The Post Office is profitable on its own revenues and receives no support from the federal government" reliably every year until their pension fund implodes with a 13 figure uncovered liability." And why is the Post Office singled out for this concern? Are other government profit centers treated the same way? Perhaps the Patent Office?
pnathan 15y ago
> UPS and FedEx are great and all, but they've nowhere near the customer focus that the USPS has. Wut? The local post offices I've used are perennially understaffed, never has enough people, the workers are unbelievably slow, the paper products are overpriced. It's absolutely the consistently worst customer service I have ever used.
- roc 15y ago
  I was referring to the mailbox that each and every residence and place of business has, regardless of their proximity and population density. FedEx and UPS have service centers, but nowhere near as many as post offices and neither run widespread residential routes for pickup.
  - tomkarlo 15y ago
    Yeah, but the law prohibits UPS and Fedex from delivering to those private mailboxes. So it's not really fair to complain they don't and the USPS does.

by roc 15y ago

timjahn 15y ago

I'm aware of the government requirements on USPS but I believe that's irrelevant. The USPS would still be in the decline it is today regardless of whether or not they had to stash away all that money today, 5 years from now, or never. It's simple: people don't use the mail as much as they used to. And that trend is only going to continue. People will never increase their use of the USPS. "UPS and FedEx are great and all, but they've nowhere near the customer focus that the USPS has." I must have a very different experience with the USPS then you. Any time I go to the post office (which now is maybe once every year or two), the employees are extremely disgruntled, not happy that you're there, and not very interested in helping you get what you need done. More importantly, though, in my experience, the USPS is horrible at its core job: transporting and delivering mail. They have "tracking" that doesn't actually track - it simply tells you the package has left the origin and arrived at the destination - nothing in between. Mail is consistently lost, delivered to the wrong address, or opened before delivery (by who knows). Again, this is my experience. I suspect it's not unique, but your mile probably varies.

Anechoic 15y ago
I'm aware of the government requirements on USPS but I believe that's irrelevant. The USPS would still be in the decline it is today regardless of whether or not they had to stash away all that money today, 5 years from now, or never. They would still be in decline, but they actually run an operating profit right now. If/as mail volume further declines they can cut & consolidate facilities to a point where they can still be reasonably profitable. Any time I go to the post office (which now is maybe once every year or two), the employees are extremely disgruntled, not happy that you're there, and not very interested in helping you get what you need done We all have anecdotes. My business uses USPS for shipping packages worldwide and I am a very happy customer of their services. I go to various Post Offices (01139, 06096, 01095, and 01803 among others, depending on my schedule and travel) 6 days a week to collect mail and ship packages. At this point the workers all know me very well, so it may be that my experiences are atypical, but I find them all to be extremely hardworking, friendly and willing to go the extra mile for me - for example, I mailed a letter once and didn't put enough postage on it. One of the postal workers put on the extra postage and left a note in my PO box asking me to reimburse her when I got a chance. But again, these are just anecdotes. However, even when I visit Post Offices I don't normally go to, I'm still largely happy with the services. The only complaint is that sometimes when a Post Office is very busy, I've had employees be curt with me, but in those circumstances I can understand why. They have "tracking" that doesn't actually track - it simply tells you the package has left the origin and arrived at the destination - nothing in between. Wholeheartedly agreed. They need to do better here. Mail is consistently lost, delivered to the wrong address, or opened before delivery (by who knows) I've shipped something like 2000 packages in the last 3 years to all 50 states and over 40 countries. I've had a grand total of two packages lost (and I'm pretty sure that only one of those two packages was actually lost and the other one was just a customer who wanted a free second item).
- steauengeglase 15y ago
  I'll be happy to put on my tinfoil hat and tell you what I think is really going on. The USPS does a lot more than ship packages and letters. They are also the government's mass printer. That VA letter and social security check probably wasn't printed in a Virginia suburb, but at one of the regional USPS printing offices. They also handle very high security items, not just to you, but between government agencies under conditions that would make the warden of a maximum security prison blush. The term "going postal" isn't about some guy at your local post office flipping out over the number of people waiting to get their packages weighed, but about some guy who has spent decades wondering if the guy standing next to him is a postal inspector just itching to see him screw up. To put it another way, they offset a lot of other agencies costs (at least in overhead). I'm certainly not saying it would be better or worse if all of this were handled by the private sector, but I will say it would require a lot of restructuring and make someone a huge pile of cash. Still, it is going to happen sooner or later. Politically it is just too sweet.

patio11 15y ago

Defenders of the Post Office like to say this, but it is at odds with reality. The prefunding requirement only requires them to have the NPV value of future payments for everyone who currently or formerly works for them. This is how everyone should accumulate pensions: the alternative is an accounting gimmick in which you promise unsustainable future payments today and then make yourself scarce (or ask for the taxpayer to clean up your mess) when they come due tomorrow. (The minimum requirement for all employers is that they implement pay-as-you-go, which means that someone's pension should be fully funded at the point where they start drawing benefits. This means that, if you hypothetically have 100k employees who are 5 years from retirement, you can report a pension fund with no assets as fully funded today. This gives you five years to look under the seat cushions for the $25 billion you need to come up with to avoid insolvency. Congress has decided to not let the Post Office implement pay-as-you-go because Congress anticipates that the Post Office will, if allowed to do that, report "The Post Office is profitable on its own revenues and receives no support from the federal government" reliably every year until their pension fund implodes with a 13 figure uncovered liability.) They're separately required to produce accounting projections for the next 75 years, but those don't have a funding mandate attached to them. http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Sections/News_And_Analysis/_Blogs/NetNet/__DAILY_POSTS/CRSmemo_postal_rhb.pdf http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Sections/News_And_Analysis/... The part most relevant to the discussion is the paragraphs surrounding: "Under current law, PAEA (P.L. 109-435) requires USPS to determine the actuarial present value of future retiree health payments for current or former employees and to amortize that liability over a 40 year period."

roc 15y ago
> "This is how everyone should accumulate pensions" Probably. Yet this is the only group that is required to. And they've been required to make up the difference under a very short timeframe. Should every pension fund be given only 10 years to correct the situation? > "Congress anticipates that the Post Office will, if allowed to do that, report "The Post Office is profitable on its own revenues and receives no support from the federal government" reliably every year until their pension fund implodes with a 13 figure uncovered liability." And why is the Post Office singled out for this concern? Are other government profit centers treated the same way? Perhaps the Patent Office?

pnathan 15y ago

> UPS and FedEx are great and all, but they've nowhere near the customer focus that the USPS has. Wut? The local post offices I've used are perennially understaffed, never has enough people, the workers are unbelievably slow, the paper products are overpriced. It's absolutely the consistently worst customer service I have ever used.

roc 15y ago
I was referring to the mailbox that each and every residence and place of business has, regardless of their proximity and population density. FedEx and UPS have service centers, but nowhere near as many as post offices and neither run widespread residential routes for pickup.
- tomkarlo 15y ago
  Yeah, but the law prohibits UPS and Fedex from delivering to those private mailboxes. So it's not really fair to complain they don't and the USPS does.