Posted on 05/10/2011 3:36:03 PM PDT by Beaten Valve
The U.S. Postal Service posted a $2.2 billion net loss in its second quarter and said it might be unable to pay its debts by September.
The agency, which has been battling falling mail volumes and competition from FedEx (FDX.N) and United Parcel Service (UPS.N), said it expects to hit its borrowing limit by the September 30 end of the fiscal year, and will have to default on payments to the federal government unless Congress intervenes.
"The Postal Service continues to seek changes in the law to enable a more flexible and sustainable business model," said Chief Executive Patrick Donahoe in a statement.
The Postal Service -- which posted a net loss of $8.5 billion at the end of fiscal 2010, its fourth straight year of losses -- has asked Congress for permission to cut Saturday mail delivery.
The agency lost a bid last summer to raise rates on first-class mail beyond the pace of inflation.
The mail carrier, which delivers about 40 percent of the world's mail and does not receive tax revenue, announced in March that it would eliminate 7,500 jobs and close 2,000 post offices in an attempt to cut costs
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
Screw them, their unions, their leaders, their management, their rank and file!
What can we do to make their pain and dire situation worse? Boycott? Go to paperless billing? Let’s shove them over the edge-—they are clearly a Obama constituency!
BOYCOTT THEM!
The post office owns a lot of property. Too bad they weren’t smart enough to sell some of it before obama took office and it was still worth something.
“Who is covering their huge operational debts and pension obligations? The reporter must be drinking USPS coolaid.”
Pensions are funded by the USPS. They were ordered to fully fund their pensions several years ago. Operating debts are covered by loans.
“It is reasonable business practice to ensure that when a driver goes out that all the mail is loaded in such a way as not to require any resorting at all.”
You’re assuming the post office gives a shit about making life easy for their workers. They don’t. The contract folks I know hate bulk mail.
The problem is the sorting machines. They can not handle some of the bulk mail pieces like supermarket ads, etc. I’ve done enough bulk mailing to know it’s a real pita to get something through the machines. If you don’t do it often., and you’ve screwed up and you’re lucky, the local clerk will tell you that the machines are going to rip up your mailing pieces.
I’m not sure why the post office has never developed machines to do all of the sorting. My guess is it’s cheaper for a clerk to add them to the sorted mail at the delivery post office. BTW, the contract guys at the local post offices for the rural routes aren’t getting rich.
I saw a similar situation at a local garage. The owner could have bought a truck tire machine for $1,600 that would have made a sometimes impossible job of removing 24” tires from rusted rims simple. Those weighed about 375 lbs. He paid $4 per tire for demounting to folks who did it by hand and gave them 1099s.
Neither he nor the post office are going to change their ways. I suspect the post office has at least had a study that looked at the costs and potential savings. So for as many years that the post office has had sorting machines, which is quite a few years, they’ve never developed your idea beyond the current capabilities.
So much BS. How much does the Dept. of Edumacation bring? Dept. of Energy? HUD? Which one of those is mentioned in the Constitution?
Well, the Postal Service IS! Keep it, subsidize it!
Meatloaf isn’t wrong. Some clerk simply spotted your package as a local delivery and pulled it out of the mail stream. You’re extrapolating that instance into a local sorting operation that exists solely in your imagination. USPS has had a hub and spoke system using regional sorting facilities for years. It is a highly automated system that sorts mail using computers and optical character readers.
“Pensions are funded by the USPS.”
The USPS has $80 to 100 billion of unfunded liabilities. The pension fund is broke.
“Operating debts are covered by loans.’
Loans from what bank? Who would lend billions to a bankrupt organization? Of course, it is the taxpayers who are forced to finance the USPS. They are not loans. They are extortion.
Did you see my link?
Do you realize this happens all the time with me? I got two today.
Caring for workers isn’t just about being nice, it is smart business.
It helps worker morale and it saves tons of money.
We have machines now that are able to separate different types of mixed plastic from peoples trash cans, If we can do this, we surely can deal with different shaped pieces of mail.
I would go as far as to say, if I was running it, if it can’t be sorted in an automated way then it doesn’t go through the mail system.
Just can’t afford this stuff.
“The USPS has $80 to 100 billion of unfunded liabilities. The pension fund is broke.”
The pensions are fully funded and have been for a number of years. This was accomplished during Dubya’s administration. but feel free to believe whatever nonsense that makes you happy.
“Loans from what bank? Who would lend billions to a bankrupt organization? Of course, it is the taxpayers who are forced to finance the USPS. They are not loans. They are extortion.”
The USPS takes out loans against real estate and their vehicle fleet. No taxpayer funds are involved. I’m surprised that a “business professor” is unable to discover elementary facts concerning how the USPS conducts its finances.
“Me thinks they are well past the point of failing...”
Which is precisely why our idiot government will keep them afloat with more printed or borrowed money.
RE> I suggest that the government PRIVATIZE it but keep it.
Uhm, is that like Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac ?
GSE, Govt guaranteed losses. What could go wrong?
Yes, I read your link, a cursory description though some of the information is out of date. But I don’t need internet articles to get an idea of how a post office operates, I have plenty of first hand knowledge. There’s not a lot of mail sorting going on in a local post office, but there is the rough sorting of outgoing mail.
With packages a clerk is sorting them into large shipping containers according to type and to a limited degree according to destination. The reason that you are getting those packages quickly is because the clerk is spotting them as a local delivery and isn’t sending them on to the regional sorting facility. You should be happy that there are some conscientious people working in your local office, it sounds like they are trying to do a good job if you are getting that kind of service all the time.
In a hub and spoke model, you would have zero sorting at a local office.
This would be like your UPS (STAPLES) or Fedex (KINKOS) Retail Outlet sorting boxes, it makes no sense.
The local office should be for sales only and shouldn’t even have delivery drivers based out of it. Everything dropped to the retail office should go back to the hub.
That is hub and spoke, not what they believe is hub and spoke.
USPS unions are not SEIU.
One way or another you will pay for it. So bail them out or pay UPS $1.50 for a letter. IMHO, the Post Office is more business like and professional these days. They used to be a nightmare, but frankly I’m impressed. Let’s not forget that people want mail 6 days a week and most communities will not be happy if their post office is closed.
The U.S. Postal Service is pushing ahead with plans to reverse billions of dollars in anticipated losses during the next decade, but a significant overpayment to its pension fund and excessive obligations for health benefits are hindering progress,
According to USPS Inspector General David Williams, the $75 billion overpayment was the result of a misinterpretation of a 1974 law regulating pension funding. The Office of Personnel Management incorrectly made USPS fund a higher portion of the pensions than it owed, he said, adding the agency could use the $75 billion to pay off its Treasury debt and its obligations to pension and health care accounts.
http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0510/050610l1.htm
The U.S. Postal Service could save almost $38 million per year under a plan to rein in the federal workers’ compensation program, a new report by the USPS inspector estimates.
The Postal Service is the biggest participant in the program, which was created almost a century ago by the Federal Employees’ Compensation Act and supplies workers across the government with tax-free benefits as long as a doctor keeps certifying that their particular disability persists. For disabled employees with at least one dependent, the base compensation rate is 75 percent of salary; for those with no dependents, it is almost 67 percent. Upon reaching retirement age, those workers often opt to continue receiving workers’ comp in lieu of their pensions because workers’ comp pays better, the report said.
As of September, more than 700 USPS employees taking that route were at least 80 years old and three were 98, the IG found.
Last year, the Postal Service paid $1.1 billion in workers’ comp benefits and administration expenses.
http://www.federaltimes.com/article/20110509/DEPARTMENTS02/105090306
Donahoe cited a federal regulation instituted in 2007 that “...required the Postal Service to pre-fund retiree health benefits (RHB) in amounts of approximately $5.5 billion per year.” There is no other entity in the federal bureaucracy that must abide by similar rules. There is a direct correlation, said Donahoe between the Postal Services’ budget woes and the institution of the rule on RHB.
We’re going to lose Saturday mail delivery. That is already approved from what I’ve read. And may post offices have already closed with more to follow.
Privitization will increase the cost of a First Class letter, but the new price will better reflect the cost. More communications will be pushed by electronic means. Everybody wants to bill you via email already.
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