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.
We’ve all heard the mantra “recycle, reuse, and reduce,” but did you know that people focus not only on what products they should buy, but also on how their purchases are packaged, shipped, and delivered?
A recent OIG white paper,...
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For some businesses, transportation is a simple matter, getting things from point A to point B, or maybe even getting things from point A to points B, C, and D. For the U.S. Postal Service, it’s a different level of complexity altogether.
Using both contractors and postal-owned...
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Guess who just celebrated an anniversary? The Postal Service. Yesterday marked 245 years since Congress created the United States Post Office Department. So, it seems fitting that today is the day we wrap up our series on the value of the Postal Service. This week’s blog focuses on the economic...
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Mail is considered missent when it is sent to the wrong processing and distribution center or delivery unit. For example, mail originated in Albany, NY, addressed to Tampa, FL, but was received in San Francisco, CA. In 2019, the OIG surveyed postal managers, and they named missent mail as a top...
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Exit processing refers to procedures followed when an employee separates from the Postal Service. Separations are personnel actions that result in taking the employee off the rolls of the Postal Service. Procedures vary depending on the employee (i.e., staff or contractor) and the reason for the...
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