Wednesday Update:
Wow. Thanks for the fabulous response to the brainstorm. We’ve been overwhelmed by the sheer number of thoughtful responses. To give everyone enough time to comment and us a little time to read through everything, we’ve decided to extend the period for taking comments and post a blog about the brainstorm with the poll on Monday. Until then, please keep sharing your ideas. All suggestions received by Friday morning will be candidates for the poll.
Oh, a word about moderation, we moderate every comment, and our policy is not to include comments that include vulgar words (even if the words are partially obscured with other characters) or involve name calling. We have not been able to approve a few comments that were otherwise very interesting because they violated our comment policy, so please double check your comment before you submit it.
Thanks again!
Original Post:
The Postal Service is facing a financial crisis and needs to pursue every option it can to improve its net income. Pushing the Envelope thought it might be a good idea to ask for your thoughts. How do you think the Postal Service can save money or raise additional revenue?
To make this a bit more interesting, the blog team will review your ideas and pick the most popular or most interesting for a poll. We’ll post the poll on Wednesday. So brainstorm now, and be sure to come back on Wednesday to view the shortlist and to vote for your favorites.
Share your ideas in the comments below. Describe the idea, whether it involves cutting costs or generating revenue, and how much you think it could add to the Postal Service’s bottom line. Happy brainstorming!
This topic is hosted by the OIG’s Risk Analysis Research Center (RARC).
527 Comments
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Based on an analysis i did several years ago of expenses / revenue, i would suggest for the Postal Service:
~ simplify rate structure
~ partial reduction in service
~ restoration of old-fashioned customer treatment
RATES: eliminate all preferential rates – especially the business (bulk) classes of mail. Currently, First Class subsidizes these other classes; no wonder FC customers are leaving in droves. Simplify to where all mail travels either First Class, Priority, or Express
SERVICE: deliver First Class mail three days a week; Mon-Wed-Fri in one delivery area and Tue-Thu-Sat in another. This is better in several ways than the current proposal to just drop Saturdays and reduce distribution sites. Priority and Express would still offer expedited delivery as they do now.
RESTORATION: held and forwarded mail currently is subjected to onerous rules; go back to giving customers what they want and keeping their personal data private. Eliminate all the crazy merchandizing schemes – notice UPS and Fedex are not doing these things.
FINALLY: keep the Federal protection of the mail stream …. this is beneficial to our personal sense of security. The corruption of this concept in recent years should be reversed.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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I agree with this as it would allow the USPS to reduce its maintainance and fuel cost by only requiring 1/2 the number of delivery vehicles.
They could sell the excess vehicles which would also help.
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Hi everybody my suggestion to cut postal costs is to do away with stamps and create envelopes with some kind of identifying mark. Perhaps you could pattern it like the bulk rate symbols on bulk rate mail. Make the envelopes simple and perhaps you could use recycled paper. We must do everything we can to keep our postal service going. I am concerned about the number of people that could lose their jobs if Congress doesn’t step up to the plate and help the country. thanks for allowing me to give my opinion.
Bernadette
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Here in my area in colorado the front desk service is just way to slow. There will be a long line of about 15 people and there will be only 2 people working the front. This seem to happen way to offten and I wish something could be done about this.
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Just back for the King of Prussia office at 3:00 PM. Five people ahead of me, ONE clerk and 30 minutes later I was out of the door.
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1.Why not do what grocery stores do: When the lines out front get long, call people from the back to help out.
2.Coordinate with local charities, churches, etc. to convert some of excess USPS space into hotels for the homeless, training and job centers for unemployed, computer centers for those who can’t afford a computer (libraries do), off campus classrooms for public and private schools who need extra classrooms, facitlities for boys and girls clubs to get poor and homeless children off the streets, health organizations to use full time or one day a week to service local neighborhoods, homeless, etc.
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We rent cutomer service offices in such perfect locations, then only open for 2 hours on a Saturday. Has anyone compared the cost of rent in these high value areas, against a couple more hours of clerks to staff it? If you do get in the line is so long, you risk getting pushed out at closing time. Your’e only hope is that the people ahead of you storm out, and take their packages elsewhere. I’ve seen it many times. They walk out, and pay a much higher price for a little respect!
You CAN treat your customers like this. But you CAN’T do it TWICE!
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We have about 25 city routes in our office….upper management made a rule that there will be no overtime for clerks…so instead of bringing in 2 clerks for 2 hours overtime, we have 25 city carriers sitting around for 2hrs waiting for mail….really!!!…why not let every office manage themselves….i have yet to see a poo in our office…so that tells me he has no idea what’s happening in our office…this doesn’t make any sense to me…they are willing to pay 50hrs overtime to city carriers instead on 4 hrs overtime to a clerk…money down the drain….and before anyone recommends the carriers come in later…our start time is 8 am and most the time we don’t get out the office until 11am or later!
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DW
I used to live in the Northeast and during the winter several times I saw USPS mail delivery trucks stuck in snow. They sat and waited for a tow truck. Give the mail carrier a way to free his/her own truck from snow. It will save on worker overtime and gas while waiting for a tow truck. It also is much more efficient as the driver could possibly get stuck several times in one day. THey would be able to finish routes on time and burn less gas.
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It has come to my attention each year the United States Postal Service or are other Men and Women in Blue we will say the USPS. Unlike other government agencies are divided not united from our government, funding wise. Each year they face a funding blitz with an end of the year funding crisis which scares the hell out of any one wearing one of their uniforms.
Why can the United States Postil Service not have rank and authority with in its confines that much like military rank as seeing a large majority of its employees are x military. Giving them a solid management structure and easy integration of civilian employees so those that work hard have the opportunity for advancement.
If you are someone who complains about fees and invites cutbacks you are in my opinion ignorant to how hard the central government is making it for our men and women in blue. Why because you individuals keep writing letters that these forgiving United States Postal Workers for meager pay; hand carry to your governors, senators, and congress men and women; because u think stamps are too expensive. And minor related grievances.
It is my opinion that if the Post Office were to be able to operate like a Private Business aloud to produce its own products such as, creative stationary, stamps (that could be created by private individuals and the master design sold to the post office for rights to the stamps design to be sold at a profit, or even the design to be leased to the post office profitable for both the post office and the individual as a collectibles paid to the individual by how many were perch cased in royaltys), boxes, new types of packing materials or even ones that exist at a profit cuz they were bought in bulk.
Possibly even get into the e-mail market by offering free federal email address. And much like PO Box’s offer for a fee encrypted e-mail addes with vires protection that can’t be externally of open’d with a federal suppina. with the option to send certified encrypted e-mails that give u an alert when the mail u sent was opened, why shouldn’t e-mail have the same options as mail plus. And why can’t techie’s work for the post office like the geek squad at bess buy to maintain a nationally regulated federally insured e-mail service for individuals, and businesses also allowing to their techie’s to develop new services, software, and hardware far beyond my comprehension that would revolutionize mail and e-mail all together, possibly even software that would let u use the post office website to send standard e-mails through your federally insured e-mail address into physical printed out faxes at the other end? We also have already on the shelf OCR (Optical Caricature Recognition Software) where u can either take digital photos of text from any ware or even scan it; and do the opposite. Completely cutting down the transition time of the physical text to digital text to way less then half.
These are just a few of an infinite amount of possibility’s the post office had more control of managing them self’s. Just ask one of your post men and women what’s wrong with the post office today and much like when I did they can easily go off for a half an hour, so yes they know. But you know what? They always cut it short not cuz they want to but because they always deliver on time. You don’t call the factory to talk to the designer of your car to tell u what is wrong car so they pull your mechanic’s certifications, you ask you mechanic. Chances are if you pull your mechanic’s license the only mechanic’s left will pull all the money out of your wallet in such proportions you cant use yours.
If your not part of the solution your part of the problem. So if you are agitated ask your postmen postwomen what kinda problems there facing and what can be done to fix them. Then send that to your govanor, senator, or congressmen.
And if each post office is treated like a private business and has a ranking system like the military much like a a interconnected franchise cost will go down and extra money will be allocated to problem spots and if there is a subsusudy for the capital of the post office such as planes, trucks, and hopefully 96’ – 98’ Jeep Cherokees with the steering left side swiched ( a suv with a lot of space and vary cheaply can run for 400 -500 thousand miles and are stock with dana axels and a straight six factory ready off road capability’s with a huge bottom clearance and can even be equipped with a plow) but what ever.
But these are just empty suggestions from a clinically insane person. Just glad I’m not gonna do all the work. Happy Trails America
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The postal Service can save money by having scanners for the Postal workers that have paper in the trackong devise that has the appropriate invention for time and efficiency at civillians addresses as well as at the Government facility.
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I think they should allow companies to purchase ad space on their vehicles and carriers. They could make a fortune…these vehicles are everywhere!
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Virtual Mail Boxes
Most people are meeting and talking with people online. People don’t know who they are talking to so I was thinking of virtual mailboxes. If someone online wants to send a gift or anything and people don’t want them to know where they are and have confidentiality then a virtual mail box would be great.
All the mail will still go to their mail boxes but to a Virtual P.O.
Like on the address side it will say Virtual MS3476. It will give a state and maybe a city then a code.
Also make it where you can change info online about your virtual boxes.
This does make more work for the Post office to read the mail but they need to make it where people know that if you use a virtual box it will take up to 3 days longer to receive.
We have online friends all over the world. Do you really want anyone popping up at your house cause they mailed you some type of gift.
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I would gladly pay a fee of $100/year to have our mail picked up and delivered to our doorstep. Our mailbox is only 300 feet from our house, but we live on a busy street. Everytime I put outgoing bills in the mailbox and raise the red flag, I feel like I’m telling potential thiefs “Come steal the mail out of my mailbox..Chances are there are checks in here that you could steal, “wash” and alter!” I bet there are lots of people that would pay a fee to have “door” delivery just for the peace of mind that their mail won’t be stolen…..
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You actually make a great point Eileen. I already pay a fee to my bank to have an ATM card, a checking account, and an IRA account. This combined with my information access account (I mean really, what truly informed American has no broadband in an Urban or residential area?). Not that it is a necessity or requirement for existence, but let’s be reasonable. That said, I have someone I suspect of tampering with my mailbox, but what am I supposed to do about it? This suspected prankster likes to open my box door and play other parlor games, all of which have been reported to the USPS, and the Police numerous times. But, what can they really do. So I simply went digital! No bills (with exception of course, our draconian gas supplier still does not have a paperless option), among others…., mostly government! I can tell you I sleep better at night. And, the rest of the standard stuff, or magazines, I’m on the way to being totally digital! NOOK, e-reader, and happy to be doing it!!! No newspapers, no anything…. Sorry…. The only thing constant in life is change….
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my idea is to create revenue, by adding a kios to check points at the airport for travelers who have last minute items they want to mail to their next destination, you could implement your if it fits it ships program.
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Start having your postmaster and supervisors punch a clock and keep them honest…. too much of this has gone undocumneted……..this is a huge money saver.
Also the techs that maintain your Merlin machines…….. why have someone show up 2-3 times per week? Typically these machines are only used a few times per MONTH!!
I would bet these ideas will be shot down>>>> mostly because they make too much sense!!!
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