What the USPS Is Up Against
The Washington Post this week editorialized that the U.S. Postal Service must take radical steps to survive in the 21st Century. It pointed to the USPS’s ever-worsening financial state and the fact that everything is moving online.
Check out the Washington Post editorial here.
Nobody disputes this.
The Post notes Europe’s partially increasingly privatized mail services which it says are “leaner and greener than the USPS.”
Okaaay.
The Post asserts that the USPS’s antiquated business model, heavy unionization and Congressional interference impedes it from running like a real business.
This misses several important points.
First, the Post did not mention that every year the USPS must pre-pay $5.8 billion to cover the health care cost of retired employees.
That would be a burden on any business. This sort of thing played a part in the bankruptcy of General Motors and may explain why corporate pensions have been largely replaced by things like 401K programs largely because of the expense.
Then, there’s the question of universal service. Would a semi- or fully privatized USPS be very inclined to deliver to remote locations, say Wasilla, AK?
Is the USPS really just a business and not probably the oldest and most trusted government service?
True, the USPS could clean up its act in many ways.
At the recent Fast Forward conference, Direct Marketing Association chairman Kelly Browning hinted that the USPS’s summer sale on standard mail postage rates was the product of two years of negotiations.
One wonders why trying out this idea took so long when it seems obvious the USPS should do something to work with its largest group of customers.
There are countless other examples.
Wasn’t the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 supposed to give the USPS increased “flexibility” to operate in the marketplace?
The problems plaguing the USPS are complex and of long standing. And yes, it must adapt to current day and future realities.
But one must hesitate when anyone says the postal service should be free of Congressional “micromanagement” as the Post did.
June 23rd, 2009 at 5:35 pm
Larry -
Great post on addressing the conflicting scenarios the USPS faces! Would you mind posting the link to the original article by the Washington Post?
June 24th, 2009 at 11:34 am
Watching this play out over the next three-five years will be interesting. Small incremental changes may not be the answer — often each change requires that mailers change how they process and prepare mail. Was reading last week how the USPS has announced no changes in terms of mail regs over the next six months and mailers were happy about that. (Can view article at
http://www.commintel.net/blog/no-usps-changes-six-months-wupdate)
June 24th, 2009 at 12:53 pm
The Washington Post is nothing but Compost and anyone who reads it; their mind is full of S___!
Mark Rybeck
July 7th, 2009 at 10:04 am
The USPS does have a tendency to forsake customer service because it IS a monopoly. In a year when private businesses like hotels and restaurants to name a few, are NOT raising their prices in order to compete, the USPS raised its prices because it doesn’t have to compete. Then in a rather snob-appeal move, it gave the price breaks only to the biggest customers who could afford to pay the increases in the first place. Real customer service would have been to lower the price on a first class forever stamp if you bought a pack of say 20 or more. Real customer service would have been to hold the line on bulk mail prices until September to encourage ALL mailers to increase mailing over the slow summer months. They have no vision. Proverbs 29:18 “Where there is no vision, people perish” The same can be said for businesses too and the USPS is no exception.
July 23rd, 2009 at 4:27 pm
I honestly cannot believe anyone thinks 44 cents is too much to carry a letter from Texas to New York, not to mention returning it to them if they put the wrong address on it. First class stamps in Mexico cost $1.15 and they don’t deliver to half the area the USPS does. UPS and FedEx will both deliver letters for you. But they can’t come close to 44 cents.
July 23rd, 2009 at 11:19 pm
The USPS is among the least customer-friendly organizations I know of. Process-oriented, not results-oriented when it comes to dealing with customers. Just like the old Ma Bell was.
August 18th, 2010 at 5:33 pm
Thanks for the post! I personally don’t think there’s any way a privatized USPS could work for everyone - like you said, what motivation would they have to go to remote places? It needs to be the way it is now.