WASHINGTON, DC — The U.S. Postal Service ended its third fiscal year quarter (April 1 – June 30) with a greater-than-expected net loss of $1.1 billion. The national economic slowdown reduced mail volume at an accelerated pace and continued inflation in fuel prices produced rapidly escalating transportation costs. Despite these financial challenges, Postal Service employees delivered record-breaking service performance in the third quarter.
For the third quarter ending June 30:
Operating revenue was $17.9 billion, a decrease of $437 million, or 2.4 percent, compared to the same period last year.
Operating expenses totaled $19.0 billion, an increase of only $178 million, or 1.0 percent, from the third quarter last year, despite substantial increases in fuel prices.
Expenses include $1.4 billion of the $5.6 billion payment to the Postal Service Retiree Health Benefits Fund that the Postal Service is required to make by Sept. 30, 2008, under the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006.
Mail volume was 48.5 billion pieces, a 5.5 percent drop from the same period last year. First-Class Mail and Standard Mail volume were each down 5.5 percent in the third quarter, reflecting the challenging economic environment.
The fiscal 2008 year-to-date net loss totals $1.13 billion. The Postal Service had essentially broken even in the first half of the fiscal year. With no economic recovery in sight, the Postal Service expects an end-of-year, economy-driven net loss.
“When the economy does rebound, mail volume may not return to previous levels,” said Postmaster General John Potter. “This requires that we significantly accelerate process improvements and the realignment of resources in order to achieve long-term financial success. Failure to do so will threaten our ability to meet our mission of providing universal service at affordable prices.”
Record-Breaking Service Performance
In the third fiscal quarter, on-time delivery performance reached record highs for all three categories of First-Class Mail the Postal Service tracks. Overnight service was 97 percent on-time, up from 96 percent the same period last year. Two-day service was 95 percent on-time, up from 93 percent the same period last year. Three-day service was 94 percent on-time, up from 91 percent the same period last year.
“These outstanding results show the tremendous dedication of our employees to provide excellent customer service, especially as we continue to work with our unions to further reduce costs and increase efficiency,” said Potter.
Post Office Going Down…WHY?
-high school graduate management
-big bonus and salary of management
-no customer service
-too many light duty employee
-management eliminate overtime by hiring more people then they bought those expensive machines too eliminate man power job. So now they have a lot of extra employee..ha..ha..ha
-management change a lot of things that are complicated
-management creating new positions that are not too important or can be eliminated
-about 3 years ago, management said that we are losing money because mail volume going down but how come they hired more people after then.
-too stressful workplace
BEST SOLUTION…FIRED THOSE SCREW UP MANAGEMENT
The reason they’re losing so much business is because of their HORRIBLE customer service. The represenatives (with some exceptions, of course) are incredibly rude and lazy. I called the post office Customer Service a few days ago just to ask about a Change of Address request and the lady misunderstood my question and answered a question that I did not ask then when I asked her the question again, she shouted at me repeatedly saying the same thing she had said before. And then she hung up. I know I should have just hung up earlier, but I was completely shocked. I will be glad if the USPS gets completely eliminated. Most of them are getting paid without doing anything other than yelling at people all day. They’re too relaxed, thinking they’ll keep their jobs forever. I have only encountered a few who are meticulous and not mean.
I retired a year ago. I was a EAS employee.
I cannot start to tell you the level of ineptitude and ignorance displayed by my peers in mail processing (P&DC). It was frightening seeing how many EAS employees were functioning illiterates. Some comments (Phil) seem to prop up the fact that EAS employees are deserving of the money they are paid. NOT!
Does this include me? YES
I used to be a Mailhandler before getting ‘promoted’, I found that I had to do less work, employ less mental prowess as a EAS floor supervisor, than that as a mailhandler.
Small wonder that the USPS is on the ropes presently, this is the beginning of the end to the USPS as we all know it. Assign blame freely,
you won’t be too far off the mark, as ignorance and apathy by EAS employees have now culminated into this present situation.
For Sambo and others: Management is inundated with numerous dynamic tasks daily. True! The most important of which is the mailflow, but like I said earlier management is inundated with tasks. Therefore when a craft person masters a task by performing the same tasks day to day and ultimately becoming an expert at that task, how can they ridicule management for not knowing that task as good as they do?
Simple Craft narrow focus/ Management wide focus this is not a fantasy it is a fact!. Let’s say I take that craft employee (that does the same thing day after day after day) and let them function within the same dynamic playing field as the supervisor would that craft employee excel? MAYBE! Here is what would NOT happen. That craft employee would NOT be ridiculed for NOT knowing as much as that EAS employee. Why because the nature of that EAS job is dynamic & volatile, and they must know much about many things and cannot know all about of everything. If anyone were to know ALL about everything why would they work for USPS and not be self employed? By the way it’s not 205B it’s 204B
The problem is that most all of the supervisors don’t know the mail or mail flow. So in turn they don’t know how to instuct employees how to handle certain situations. Recently we had our dump removed from the P&DC, all sacked mail is now being sent to the SPBS unit. Well in doing this we now have an operation within an operation. You see alot of sack mail comes presorted via direct cr rt bundles, direct mx sts bundles, etc. Well as the new sack volume started to reach the SPBS unit, almost all of the employees didn’t know you could send this sack on its way without dumping. So they just dumped the sacks on the belt causing a double handle effect, which in turn costs more man hours and money. My point is that had management had any kind of sense/brains, they wouldl have had a service talk explaining things so the workers would be able to handle the mail in a more productive manner. But who am I but a dumb employee who doesn’t know how things work. And by the way they added twice the work to our unit without adding even 1 extra person, and then get mad when mail doesn’t get done. Let’s not forget also most management or 205b’s, are those employees we all use to hate to work with because you always had to carry their weight.
Our post office has been paying record amounts of rent for an antiquated building that needs millions in repairs. The owner wanted us out years ago and there are many vacant buildings that could be suitable with some rennovations. We could have property bought decades ago that would still be worth much more even with the real estate crisis, but the Postal Service won’t fight to own. Now, a city of over 100,000 may have its carriers of 140 routes divided up between nearby city post offices; decreasing rent but increasing travel costs. With the downturn in the economy, maybe the postal service can pick up some bargains and own their buildings. Then again, if the Postal Service doesn’t plan to be around much longer, keep renting.
the post office is ran by the most ignorant bunch of mnanagement in the world. they don’t think about quality only mumbers and it will be the demise of the postal service. we have to foster a better working environment and you lead by example not by title. management just does not get it.
I carried mail for 4 years and I have been a supervisor for 2 years. I told my employees that our jobs are in jeopardy lets work hard but no one
cared to listen. Now everything is going down the hill I hope we can get these militant union stewards to do their job “Work” while carriers work, deliver mail, these stewards listen music, talk on the phone, and take 2-3 hour lunch breaks. If you say something they all get together and ruin your operation. Carriers/Clerks have really no idea what their dues are used for.
i was just layed off last week, with the assurance of my manager that as one of 4 TEs in my office, that i did’nt have to worry. After busting my a** for the last year, watching about 10 “light duty” or “injured” employees sitting on their behind, letting me take the slack plus full routes. This last year has been rediculous, i read some of the comments above, and favoritism is the key word. I had a tendency to “question” my supervisor on his decisions and I was the chosen one to have “let go”. How bout some pay cuts….watching light duty employees milk the usps, plus overpaid supervisers that have never carried a full route in 100 degree weather, makes it clear whose behind you have to kiss to keep a job with usps. I received a letter with no contact #, no way to inquire about another position at usps, my manager just said, nope theres no one to talk to about this, sorry. thats all he had to say. and sent my on my way. what company does that? now i will try to get a job at ups or fed ex. usps doesnt appreciate the hard workers, just what looks good on the books.
the function of the FSS and other new equipment is to sort the mail to the delivery level. this way it is no longer necessary for the carriers to sort the mail by hand before going out on their routes. The goal is to eliminate a third of the carrier positions. their is a video on you tube from the Post Office stating this. as to the practice of nepotism, now its mostly about getting high enough so your job is one of the last to go. In the private sector, the best minds would be brought in to broaden income streams and cut out the cancerous dead weight. In this organization short sighted “me first” management is the rule. I don’t fear the PO being privatized, it would actually save real workers .
“free the mail”
The Post Office is a government organization, it isn’t supposed to make a profit. That being said, the management morons are clueless. Actually, I shouldn’t say clueless. They know what they are doing. They are trying to save their necks by screwing the bottom people. They are only concerned about the pfp’s. Where else can you get a 39% raise when you have screwed up the post office. Why is management going ahead with the fss deployment? Why, because the fss is costing millions of dollars to implement and operate. Management keeps saying mail volume is going down(true), so why aren’t they shelving this until things get better. Also, if it doesn’t get better, why don’t they scrap it. A complete waste of money if the volume is tanking. The fss machine won’t pay for itself. Management will never admit any of this because it was made out to be the endall of processing. Then, I hear it isn’t working as good as they say it was going to, shocking development. Want another disaster? Well, how about the PARS system? PARS is a complete joke. How much money was wasted on that system. I can only imagine. Management never gets anything working real good. They just go onto the next system and waste alot of money. I don’t care if they do get machines to do some of the processing but just get THE DAMN THINGS WORKING REALLY GOOD. Management is only interested in one thing. Get the numbers to look good so they get the bonus. A majority of the management people couldn’t manage their way out of a wet paper bag. Most of them should be fired because they are the ones who allowed the mess the Post Office is in now. Management wants the bonus first, then they try to worry about other things later. I wonder how many more VP’s will pop up with salaries around $200,000. Also, how about all of the people that will be hired as support people? Management personnel have increased over the last five years. Have the craft workers increased? No, management isn’t serious about saving alot of money until they drop people from their ranks.
hey ‘free the mail’,did you know the post office does not not run on tax money? it runs on business mail you get in your mailbox. no, you didn’t know that because you are a idiot. the reason the post office is losing money is because they have too many lazy,inbred,supervisors and postmasters who don’t do anything to earn a paycheck !!!!!
They can lose 10 billion as far as I am concerned, until some of these do-nothing management jobs are eliminated then I am not going to worry about it. When these people are let go, then I will take it seriously. We could save money by putting these “experienced” postal employees on the steet to carry mail and letting some of the TE’s go.
yeah so i guess they about broke even lost a few hundred million probably because of the reduced mail volume and fuel prices…..most of that 1.1 billion was just because they were finishing up paying their 5.6 billion with a 1.4 billion dollar payment by september 30, 2008. why didn’t they let the public know that? the vague statement about usps losing 1.1 billion in one quarter is misleading to say the least…..
oops i mean like a couple billion or so forgot about the 437 million deal…whatever they are all full of it anyway
uh….seems like they basically said over 5 billion went toward a required payment to the retirement fund which kicked the amount up to 19 billion….which they refered to as “operating expenses”….but if you subtract that amount the supposed operating expenses drops to less than 14 billion…now when they say compared to last years third quarter of 17 billion approx. then that means that last years third quarter didn’t necessarily include the over 5 billion payout to shore up the retiree funds….so actually wouldn’t that mean that operating expenses were less than 14 billion and we actually did a approximately 3.9 billion dollar profit over last year?……i mean, is it just me?….maybe i m crazy……..
I worked at a P&D as a casual for a little more than a year.
Cronyism, Nepotism and Favoritism! That’s all they know.
I watched a black lady with a phony tilte walk around all day doing nothing and getting paid for it.
I did the work for a 19 year old girl who really couldn’t( or wouldn’t) carry her weight. She had connections to management, so she got hired. I didn’t, so I quit. Couldn’t stomach her gettin’ paid for my work.
There were people who worked there many years as casuals only to see their jobs given to “insiders”.
There were many other crooked things going, including embezzlement, but management was incompetent.
The plant manager got his job, because his dad had been a Post Master, so what woud you expect?
I will cheer the day the Post Office is completely privatized.
Free the Mail: Apparently you are not a postal employee, don’t have a clue how our retirement system works. Until you have the knowledge, you shouldn’t make any comments here. Go find out what OPM stands for and look that up before you open your mouth and put your foot into it. That is where our retirement funds come from. Just like any other federal employee that retires, VA, IRS, etc. As for costing the post office twice as much to deliver the mail…again, if you knew what was going on inside this organization rather than hear-say, you should shut your mouth. Then the workers see that management stands around and yacks all day while we are out delivering mail, sorting mail, etc and we are held accountable but there is no accountability for them. The managers skew the numbers to obtain hefty raises(one reason the salaries are 78% off the workforce) and the upper managers do the same. There are now more delivery points, higher fuel costs that are driving up the cost of this business. Meanwhile, managers are receiving hefty raises, hefty relocation fees to transfer to other sites that are overburdened with managers. Move the incompetent managers around the states and back again. Still the mail gets delayed. Five managers here yesterday that make over a half million dollars in salaries and STILL the mail is delayed. They can’t manage nor can they justify their hefty salaries. But what does the POSTMASTER GENERAL POTTER DO, he gives himself a HEFTY 39% pay INCREASE along with his newly named VICE PRESIDENTS. (the lowly craft workders got 1% raises and increase in percentage we pay for health insurance EACH YEAR) When managers retire they are hired as private contractors to the post office and their buddies hire them. Corruption, nepotism, etc. is all the norm for the USPS. It’s not the labor force that does this, it’s the management! So go away until you know what BS goes on inside the post office and stop posting what you have no idea about….
‘preciate the sacrifice. Heh, heh. ‘scuse me while i carry my pile of money back to Tex-ass.
My letter carrier retired. Now it costs the PO/Taxpayer twice as much to deliver the mail. When the guys that came in under the Union sellout get to be the majority you retirees had better watch out. You sold them down the Social Security river. I hope they tell the PO to cut your retirement so they can have a pay raise. 78% 0f the PO costs are labor. No company can make a profit with costs like that. Blame the managers but you still are a bunch of greedy people who don’t have a clue how a business that isn’t a monopoly make money. You still are government employees. Remember the delivery vehicles that had USPS.gov on them?
The workroom floor toxic,Management which is top-heavy and where the reduction in force is needed.Management has created breaking point stress among the workers, while collecting a 39%raise.Our Managers (many) are GED diploma graduates, and lack management skills and do not have the skill sets to manage. Its an inbred , political system.Not exactly cutting – edge.
The incompetent management up above and bad decisions have cost the postal service dearly. Now it’s time for the debt to be paid, but unfortunately it will be the workers who will have to pay with cut backs, and possible layoffs.
We just received letters yesterday that we were being reassigned out of our bid cluster. The Senior Area Manager said in our stand up it was his decision to close our facility to save the post office money; but wait, it’s not closing and the really good news is other they are going to keep it open with about 20 people, but still pay the utilities and building cost just like when 400 of us were still there…..in the mean time he told us they have contracted out our jobs to a contractor that hires illegals…nice….at the HASP they currently have contractors using illegals and foreign nationals and we get back half the mail to be worked or they flat send it to the wrong location…San Antonio instead of it’s real destination of San Diego and let the other end fix their screw up. This idiot(Senior Area Supervisor) Just got through screwing up the Ft. Worth bid Cluster now they have moved him to Dallas to implode this one! Over the last 12 years I have seen these incompetent managers put in million dollar machines and tear them out..we had 3.5 million dollar camera systems throughout the building that have never been turned on…I mean never..We had a thief in the building tampering with my time card and hiding my gear and messing with my equipment. I caught this jerk messing with my time card and I reported it to management and and the postal inspectors(another worthless group of idiots)told me the cameras don’t work and then they informed the thief that I turned him in(he had two supervisors buddies)and I had death threats called at the post office pay phone to my unlisted number(his supervisor buddies gave it to him from the files in the office) and was harassed daily by this jerk..postal inspectors didn’t do anything because they said I was white and they didn’t want to get involve because the criminal was black and the supervisors were black..go figure.
We have had a dozen plant managers go through the door over the last 12 years and everyone has managed to screw the plant up…..either trying to work under the table deals with contractors using illegals or better yet there are several former plant managers that set up contracts just before they retired and one is now the managing supervisor at company he gave the contracts to! This current idiot is no different. He is jocking for his big kick back bonus and the next rung up the ladder of incompetent USPS execs!
The postal service must do what other large corporations are doing- lay off white collar employees. It can no longer afford diversity specialists and those that reside in the land of misfit managers-operations support. If your job doesn’t directly facilitate moving the mail then it should be considered superflous, as most of these are. The public will not stand for these maake work jobs anymore.
Would be nice if he defined employee because so far htey only treat us like the enemy and the cause of all failings.