Posted on 08/05/2010 9:41:55 AM PDT by Zakeet
The U.S. Postal Service reported a $3.5 billion loss in its most recent quarter Thursday, as mail volume plummets and retiree health care costs mount.
The USPS, a self-supporting government agency that receives no tax dollars, said operating revenue declined 1.8% to $16 billion during the fiscal 2010 third quarter compared to a year earlier, while operating expenses spiked 4.2% to $19.5 billion.
The quarterly loss was the fourteenth in the last sixteen quarters, the postal service said.
"A significant portion of USPS losses in the past few years has been due to an unprecedented decline in mail volume -- down more than 20% since 2007," the USPS said in a statement. "The replacement of letter mail and business-transaction mail by electronic alternatives continues to cause downward pressure on mail volume."
"Securing the fiscal stability of the Postal Service will require continued efforts in all of these areas, as well as further review of retiree health benefit prefunding," said postmaster general John Potter.
"It also will require that the Postal Service gain flexibility within the law to move toward five-day delivery, to adjust our network as needed, to develop new products the market demands, and to work with our unions to meet the challenges ahead," he added.
(Excerpt) Read more at money.cnn.com ...
I thought that the $75 billion excess came from mandatory calculation methods imposed upon them by regulators and Congress, as opposed to any kind of duplicity or bad faith on their part.
First, I understand that you are a Postal Service retiree, so don’t get all defensive. My question is sincere. If the postal service is not taxpayer funded, how can they continue to operate losing billions each quarter for 14 quarters straight? They should have gone belly up years ago. Do they have some sort of slush fund they are operating out of? I am just trying to understand.
“They could probably cut the loss to near zero simply by eliminating curbside (and certainly “door”) delivery and require folks to get their mail at community cluster boxes”
That’s what occurs in our community especially with any new development. Works well and Pete gets 500 houses’ mail delivered in less than 45 min. They had talked about discontinuing rural deliveries in our area and having those customers use PO boxes, but I’m not sure what came of it. Saturday delivery is convenient to the customer, but it is not vital. I do like first class and priority mail, it is substantially cheaper than fed ex or ups. There is a lot the USPS should stop doing for “free” for its customers. I would love to see the USPS have a system similar to “no call” for the ridiculous amount of bulk and solicitation mail I receive. I asked at the local po and they said nothing they can do. I would also be willing to pay a fee for deliver of my mail similar to the price of a po box rate
I had a very recent incident where the USPS took a parcel post package, opened it during transit, stole the contents and replaced them with an AA book, then resealed the envelope with tape and delivered it to the addressee as if nothing was amiss. The USPS doesn’t even care to investigate the theft ... union protections don’tchaknow! NEVER send anything bigger than a letter via the USPS thieves.
If they are letting money be sucked off the top by the retirement system that has an impact on the amount of variable costs which are going to be looked at to estimate relative pay levels for different crafts and a host of specialty occupations.
USPS owes it, as a good faith matter, to LOOK AT WHERE IT'S SPENDING THE MONEY and to make sure that it is being spent correctly.
This is like the THIRD TIME USPS has been caught (in terms of billions of dollars) failing to watch what it pays OPM!
Maybe the first time it was a surprise, but the second time? And now, a third time, and the dollar values just keep growing. It's BAD FAITH.
At some point here I think we are speaking of criminal acts on the part of Postal management and OPM retirement system analysts and managers.
Turning post offices into private franchise operations may help also. Like UPS stores.
The USPS is dead. They are just being kept alive artificially with billions of taxpayer dollars.
Now, about government agency losses, when is the last time you saw Department of Defense bring back the loot to pay for its existence?
Apparently, Hibah Yousuf does among other CNN idiots.... =.=
And how many billions is that?
Duhhh. Keep hiking those rates and people will keep switching to paperless billing and alternative shippers.
Read the headline. They won’t operate at a loss, so that money will come from us.
About the only mail we get here is stuff from the govt, and other such junk mail. Then we have to pay the trash collector to take it away, too.
Ok. That seems to make sense and provides some pricing stability and probably saves some money with fewer stamp changes...but they’ve been losing billions each year for almost 4 years and they adjusted rates in ‘01, ‘02, ‘06, ‘07, ‘08, ‘09 and now ‘11. Shouldn’t they have had a few surpluses by now, or are they playing catch up with respect to their pension and benefits?
They might even get the post offices’ PO box rental percentages up if they weren’t the only “mail centers” that wouldn’t accept packages from the major common carriers like FedEx and UPS.
The bit about FedEx is especially stupid, as Express Mail is now just a relabelled FedEx service, and a FedEx truck backs up to the post office loading dock every day to collect/deliver any Express Mail shipments.
UPS tried a similar policy with their UPS Stores briefly, where they wouldn’t accept FedEx or DHL packages but customer outcry (and the resulting box rental cancellations) made them reverse their policies. So the USPS is the only service where your rented mailbox can only get USPS shipments. Idiots.
It's a system ~ BTW, the law requires them to get rate increases sufficient to pay their costs, so they have filed for new rates already.
Let me give you a hypothetical comparison ~ you get paid weekly. So, on Friday you get your check and that day you make $1,000,000.
The rest of the week you do nothing but spend, spend, spend, and by Thursday you have NOTHING, plus a new credit card bill.
You just had 6 days of massive losses, and 1 day of profit!
That's the way they do it, but with very large numbers.
I know the postal services is in the constitution, but it's time to close shop. Most people could survive with 3 days of mail a week. Make it two and have 1 carrier cover two different routes. Announce you are closing in 6 years and the companies and the employees will figure it out, as well as the customers.
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