Does the Postal Service Need to Re-examine Its Delivery Service Standards?
Filed under Delivery & Collection
Tags: Delivery, financial crisis, Saturday Delivery, service, standard, Transportation
Public policy debates about solving the Postal Service’s financial crisis have largely focused on reducing costs by cutting service such as Saturday delivery, transitioning from brick and mortar post offices to alternative retail sales channels, or limiting other functions performed by the Postal Service. There has been less talk about the costs of meeting delivery service standards, which were reviewed following the passage of the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006.
Can the Postal Service relax some of its requirements to save money in transportation or processing costs? Right now, its goals are to deliver First-Class Mail in 1 to 3 days and Standard Mail in 3 to 10 days. A slight adjustment of these standards in particular areas might make it possible to save a great deal of costs. Instead of developing the goal first and trying to reach those levels, no matter how costly it is, maybe the Postal Service should closely analyze its infrastructure and develop goals that allow for reaching the greatest efficiencies.
Loading ... Loading ...For example, if the service standards for bulk mail from Chicago to Los Angeles were given an additional day the Postal Service could avoid the expense of trucks and instead utilize economical rail transportation. A First-Class Mail package that currently travels by air could be carried by truck if given another day.
By relaxing service standards, the Postal Service can move further towards a hub and spoke network, which could result in substantial savings. Currently, plants may have lots of half-empty, smaller trucks fanning out to a multiplicity of plants only once or twice a day. Under this new strategy, many trucks would go to a mail consolidation facility, which consolidates the mail and ships it on larger, fuller trucks to the destination facilities throughout the day. This design has the additional benefits of network stability and is capable of scaling up or down with changing mail volume.
The bottom line is that the Postal Service and its stakeholders need to decide what service standards are worth the cost. The Postal Service should have an honest and informed discussion about the cost savings that it can pass on to the public by relaxing some of the present delivery service standards.
Do you think the Postal Service should adjust its delivery standards to cut its costs?
This topic is hosted by the OIG’s Risk Analysis Research Center (RARC).
142 Responses to “Does the Postal Service Need to Re-examine Its Delivery Service Standards?”
Pages: [15] 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 … 1 » Show All
Pages: [15] 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 … 1 » Show All
Leave a Reply
Hello and Welcome!
Social Media
Search
Change Font Size
What's Hot This Month
Recent Comments
- bernadette on Having Problems with Your Time and Attendance Records? The OIG Wants to Hear From You.
- To All Postal Employees: It’s Time to Start Sending Time Thieves to Jail and Get the Unions Off their Butts | Postal Employee Network on Having Problems with Your Time and Attendance Records? The OIG Wants to Hear From You.
- Felix on Having Problems with Your Time and Attendance Records? The OIG Wants to Hear From You.
- Bob on Give Customers What They Really Want
- ZACK on Having Problems with Your Time and Attendance Records? The OIG Wants to Hear From You.
Recent Topics
- Having Problems with Your Time and Attendance Records? The OIG Wants to Hear From You.
- Are They Listening to Me?
- Postal Service as a National Asset
- Safety First!
- Automated Package Stations – Rapidly Expanding Service in Europe!
July 19th, 2010 at 6:03 am
How about changing residential delivery to 3 days a week? You could cut your delivery fees in half. Have two routes; M-W-F and T-TH-SAT. Each residential address will have a delivery based on routing. Business and Priority mail will have different routes with daily service. This is the age of electronic mail. Most people do not even check their mail box everyday. This is an ideal that needs to be voted on, there will be opposition, but I think it is a sensible ideal.
May 28th, 2010 at 2:39 am
Don’t cut Saturday. Saturday delivery, at no extra charge, is the USPS primary service advantage over the $15 surcharge Saturday delivery ($15 on top of already highly inflates prices!) of FedEx and UPS. Getting rid of Saturday will take away all of your Saturday delivery customers, thus reducing post office revenues even further. This loss will negate what savings can be had from cutting Saturday.
Instead, cut Tuesday and/or Thursday, except for holidays in which Monday, Wednesday, or Friday are off, in which case special Tuesday and/or Thursday service will substitute for the Monday, Wednesday, or Friday that is off because of the holiday. Tuesday and/or Thursday will not be missed as long as Monday, Wednesday, and Friday are still in the picture.