U.S. Postal Service: salvageable or doomed?

who cares that the government is currently running a program to send 100 billion pieces of junk mail out?

― iatee, Thursday, March 28, 2013 6:39 PM (52 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i don't really see what the concern is

― 乒乓, Thursday, March 28, 2013 6:41 PM (50 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i think there are some pretty legitimate environmental concerns tbh

this thread is interesting. my parents worked for the post office. i hope it continues to exist. what could it conceivably look like, other than a PO/bank hybrid? (also, why does this have to be about rural v. urban?)

bcz iatee

because the entire postal service is run as an urban->rural transfer program.

and are the distances between people really at the heart of the matter/the main thing to consider? (not a rhetorical q, just haven't thought about that way)

yes. it costs more money to get things to remote places and to keep offices open in places fewer customers. the post office isn't given much flexibility here to adjust like a normal business.

places with

but the solution must surely be more complicated than asking people to not live remotely?

USPS should become the facebook public option

sry the social network public option

I've asked before it never works xp

People have a right to get things delivered to remote places by the federal government. It is a just use of state powers.

And while we're at it, FedEx and UPS should be penalized more for competing against the state. Their competition lowers the efficiency of the state's economies of scale.

We should outlaw email too, because that really ruined economies of scale for the USPS.

i have no idea if those posts are serious or not

new board description

'competing against the state'

iatee too literal

clover otm

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/us/monitoring-of-snail-mail.html?hp&_r=0

interesting

if you go to live in the woods they will probably just have a division that uses birds to spy on you

Home delivery ending in Canada within five years:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/canada-post-to-phase-out-urban-home-mail-delivery-1.2459618

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hox-ni8geIw

Home delivery ending in Canada within five years

...urban home delivery.

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116374/postal-service-banking-how-usps-can-save-itself-and-help-poor

big in japan, right?

"A document unearthed in proceedings before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) reveals why the APWU is adamant that the Postal Service’s deal with Staples – and others like it – must be stopped.

The March 26, 2012, document exposes the secret privatization recommendation a Postal Service consultant made to USPS management: Eliminate most retail facilities throughout the country, along with the work of APWU employees.

The document is covered by a “protective order” that prohibits its disclosure, but the Administrative Law Judge presiding over the case has ruled that the contents can be summarized and brought out from behind the veil of secrecy.

As described by the judge in his order, the document reveals that the Postal Service’s consultant made a number of proposals to the USPS, including that the Postal Service invest in high-traffic Postal Service locations and that it eliminate the majority of the standard-volume Postal Service locations and migrate that work to retail partners that are not staffed by APWU members...."

http://www.apwu.org/news/web-news-article/secret-document-exposes-usps-privatization-planning

USPS is so great and I will miss it fiercely if it ever goes away

I'm really feeling the damage the Trump admin has done to the USPS. I still use the mail to send in payments for about 10 monthly bills, but two bills have failed to show up in the last couple of months and one payment (for ACA plan) failed to get there, requiring me to make a quick online payment on 12/31 to have coverage in 2021. I'm thinking about changing to all online payments but I hate that this seems to be part of the conservative plan for privatization. Break shit > say "see, shit is broke" > private sector takeover > profit!

We’re gonna need investigations into a lot of things. This should be one of them.

yep

Book that went out right before the holiday crush still hasn't been delivered.

Book that went out on the 21st of December still hasn't been delivered, and shows that it hasn't even reached a main sorting facility— just that "the label has been created."

A package filled with cookies and other things (sent by my long-suffering aunt every Xmas to everyone in the family) arrived a month late.

In the meantime, things I ordered a week ago are arriving on time, and so is tons of useless fucking junk mail.

I know the decimation of the post office under Trump has been dire, particularly during Covid, but the policy of slowly dealing with the backlog while keeping up with mail delivery isn't cutting it— there simple should be a two-month backlog of important mail sitting in post office sorting facilities while I'm getting offers for credit cards.

*there simply should NOT be a two-month backlog

It's insane, but I have to say I've seen things wildly inconsistent, in the most inconsistent ways. On December 27th, I dropped two packages to family members in the mail at the same post office. One to my dad and one to my sister, who both live in different small towns about an hour and a half away from me. Both sent First Class. My dad got his the next day. My sister got hers last week.

I've had some packages coming to me take over a month, but others come within a day or two. The inconsistency I've experienced is what is the most weird.

The policy in Philadelphia is now to slowly deal with the backlog while simultaneously continuing to deliver regular mail, so what's happening makes sense, but it is also MADDENING.

yup. first-in-first-out is broken. i sold a book to someone in utah and it got there in just 5 days. i have not received two DVDs from netflix (yes) i was supposed to get on january 2. but i still get bed bath and beyond coupons.

Even the junk mail I get is late— I got a postcard for some sale that ended long before the postcard was delivered.

also makes scamming easier. my bestie bought a switch from someone on Craigslist and after sending the money, the USPS tracking number showed as "label created, not yet in system", for the first two days, and it was hard for us to tell whether it was a legit problem or the slowness of USPS tracking updates, as I've seen them update much slower than usual.

unfortunately, it was a scam and she got ripped off of $200.

had to file IC3 crime report which probably will go nowhere as I am pretty sure seller was using a pseudonym

I sure as hell turned off mail order for my prescriptions

I ordered packages that both got sent out the beginning of this week and have both arrived before the estimated delivery date, so I don’t know what’s going on.

anything that gets sent to me via USPS via Amazon seems to show up on time. Bezos jumping the line

anything that gets sent to me via USPS via Amazon seems to show up on time. Bezos jumping the line

That answers it

It's going to take a long time to get this back to any reasonable working order, huh? In my experience, it is currently far worse than at any point in 2020 and seems to be going downhill with each passing week.

Latest twist I'm really enjoying is getting notified, daily, that something is out for delivery, only to have it continually get pushed back to (allegedly) the next day. Been riding this cycle every day since last Wednesday for one particular package, it's put on the truck for delivery every single day but for some reason just can't make it to my door.

our local mail deliverers are overworked and as such prone to mistakes. we constantly get stuff missdelivered, and unfortunately the last victim was my mother's water pills.

they put it in another neighbor's box and instead of bringing it to our door like every decent human being does, they returned it to sender.

Oh yeah, the amount of misdeliveries around here is skyrocketing. I've pretty much built in time every other day to redistribute mail to others and our neighborhood email group is just lousy with "anybody get my mail" and "I got so-and-so's mail" notes.

yeah we usually get knocks on the door from neighbors saying "I got your stuff", it's how we meet each other here.

I've still yet to receive a few things I ordered in December, yet items that I ordered three days ago show up no problem.

https://www.inquirer.com/news/philadelphia/usps-tracking-package-shipping-delays-philadelphia-december-20210116.html

same, I have three packages from Germany that appear to be trapped in customs, one was shipped on Oct. 15th.

So, yet another day this particular package was marked “out for delivery” but wasn’t delivered. Guessing this means it’s likely gone for good. I’d almost feel better if it had just been sitting in a distribution center without an update.

I know things are insanely slow, I totally get that. I've just never had a package show as "out for delivery" for a full week before. Basically wondering if I just need to chill longer, or if this is a case where I might want to contact the USPS sooner rather than later.