USPS Office of Inspector General

This sounds like a math problem on a standardized test: If the amount of mail processed in fiscal year (FY) 2018 declined by 5 billion pieces and total number of workers used to process mail declined by 5,000 career employees (with workhours also dropping by 4.3 million), how much did overtime costs decrease?

Answer: They didn’t. Overtime costs to process mail increased by $257 million (31 percent) in FY2018 from the previous year. What happened?

The opioids epidemic, which President Trump declared a public health emergency in October 2017, has had a national impact on many people, businesses, and organizations, including the U.S. Postal Service.

It was an especially lively six-month period covered by our most recent Semiannual Report to Congress – October 1, 2018 through March 31, 2019. The period included the partial government shutdown in December, and January saw the official appointment of our acting Inspector General to the IG position – only the third IG in our 20-year history. And then there’s all the work we did.

Processing packages from abroad, especially into the U.S. Postal Service’s JFK International Service Center in New York City, can be a challenge.

Talk of postal finances inevitably turns to the U.S. Postal Service’s retiree pension assets and obligations. With nearly $279 billion in assets, yet $41 billion below their estimated liabilities, the pension plans are a huge part of the USPS portfolio.

Our office has looked at ways to address the Postal Service’s long-term pension and health liabilities, focusing recently on ways to invest assets so they yield higher returns while minimizing risk.