Package Theft in the United States: Discussion with Rick Schadelbauer and Dr. Ben Stickle

Package Theft in the United States: Discussion with Rick Schadelbauer and Dr. Ben Stickle

Not surprisingly, e-commerce exploded during the Covid 19 pandemic as consumers were able to obtain products they wanted or needed without having to leave the safety and comfort of their homes. Growth in e-commerce has continued post-pandemic, and is expected to reach almost $1.9 trillion by 2029. Unfortunately, that growth has been accompanied by a significant increase in package theft. 

Rick Schadelbauer, a research specialist with the US Postal Service Office of Inspector General. Our latest white paper Package Theft in the United States, looks at the problem of package theft, explores steps being taken to address the problem, and identifies potential initiatives that could help maintain the integrity of the maelstrom. I'm joined by Doctor Ben Stickle, professor of criminal justice administration at Middle Tennessee State University and a recognized expert in the field of package theft. 

Doctor Stickle worked with the USPS SIG on this white paper. Welcome, Ben. 

Thank you. Rick. 

In this paper, we're talking specifically about package theft in the last mile, commonly referred to as porch piracy. Do we know how big of a problem it is? 

Unfortunately, we don't know how big of a problem it is. And that's a real problem. There's not a definitive source of package theft data, if you will. There's not like a database or anything. And because of that, we do estimates based on victims. And that can widely vary. So for example one estimate we have between 2023 and 2024 believe there's about 120 million packages that were stolen, which results in an annual loss of anywhere between 5 and $16 billion, which is just tremendous. 

And that leaves about 59 to potentially 58 million Americans have been victims of package theft just in that year alone. 

So why is it so difficult to accurately assess the full scope of the problem? 

One of the main reasons is that we have a fragmented reporting practices that really make the scale of understanding this very challenging to assess. So for one example, if a victim happens to call the police, oftentimes this crime just gets recorded as a general theft. And we don't know that it necessarily involved a package. We also have victims who might report this crime to different stakeholders like delivery companies or the retailer. 

And if they do even give it to law enforcement, none of that data actually crosses paths usually, so it makes it really hard to track. In addition to this, not every potential case of package theft is actually package theft. He could have a package. It's delivered maybe to a neighbor. My mistake. It could be delayed in transit. And even in some cases we're seeing consumer fraud that can be considered package theft. 

So altogether, it's really hard to know what's going on and get the full scale.  

So what are the impacts of package theft on the various stakeholders in the e-commerce space, such as retailers, delivery providers and customers? 

So we'll begin with retailers. Obviously this tends to be a huge financial burden for them, and they tend to be at the forefront of this by replacing items or refunding, you know, purchases of items and then having to pay to to ship those back out to consumers. So that's a real challenge that they have. But the delivery provider also suffers from this.  

They have financial losses of resources, increased operational costs, and it can damage customer relationships. And then of course you have the customer or the consumer who's also being hit by this. They're inconvenienced of having to package it stolen. They may have to wait longer to receive one of their purchases. So really this is something that impacts everybody up and down this situation. 

And what are some of the collaborative strategies that impacted parties are using to mitigate their exposure? 

Well, there's a number of these that have been going on for a little bit and continue to be of interest. So one is perhaps using a secure pickup point or delivery location. You can have it delivered to a local store or a trusted neighbor. You can use a secure locker or even a post office box to have your package delivered. 

That way you're the only one that has access to it removes that opportunity. You can request a signature when the item is delivered, and ensure again, that it's placed in the hands of someone at your residence or wherever it's delivered. Some folks have opted to have a porch locker box. You can have these installed at your home if allowed, and this is a secure device. 

You can actually have a package delivered securely to your porch. You can opt for real time tracking. Proof of delivery. These things can be helpful to be notified when a package arrives. We're now seeing AI and data analytics being lumped into this, both from those who are delivering the packages and retailers and only know where a package is, but notify you when one has been delivered. 

And we're also seeing tracking devices attached to these packages individually to allow you to know exactly where it's at at all times. Finally, you can have what we might call discreet packaging or package delivery. So where it's delivered on the porch, perhaps behind an item or an object on your porch that keeps it so it's not visible from the roadway. 

So all of these things are trying to keep a package less visible to a would-be thief. 

And what role do policymakers and law enforcement play in addressing package theft? 

Yeah, this is a really challenging question. So at the federal and state level, a number of states have either increased package theft penalties or perhaps just enacted individual standalone laws that try to address this issue. The federal level is trying to do the same thing. We haven't seen that actually happened yet, but it's been discussed for several years. 

Local law enforcement is really at a challenge here, because they don't always have all the pieces to effectively investigate a crime. And so to address this, sometimes they'll have bait packages or even set up a special lockers at a local police department police station to say, come and have your packages safely delivered. But having all these players at the table is really important to address this issue. 

So in the white paper, what were identified as some potential future initiatives that can be explored? 

Yeah. So one thing that we is discussed in there is looking at collaboration of all the parties who are impacted. And I mentioned this before, but this is really key. We need to make sure that retailers deliberately delivery providers, law enforcement, policymakers and even customers actually share data across platforms. So we can really understand the scale and scope of this problem. 

And by sharing those results, we can find out when and where this is occurring, if there's products or items or locations that are particularly risky, and then apply methods to actually address this. But it's going to take everyone kind of sharing everything together. It is nice that the Postal Service is kind of uniquely positioned to take a lead in some of this collaborative. 

They have two in-house law enforcement organizations that can work together to try and bridge some of these separate groups and bring them together, and we can certainly look at other things that are done. Congressional activities, laws, even fusion centers where this crime information is shared across different groups, across different areas to make sure we get real time ideas of what's going on. 

But ultimately to substantially reduce package theft, we have to have really significant and ongoing collaboration. And this will not only reduce package theft, but will actually help consumers and retailers and everyone involved so it can impact the US economy. We can have increased customer confidence and things that are purchased, and we can make sure that we have and facilitate, you know, good sales and travel of these goods across the e-commerce supply chain. 

Well, those are some very interesting ideas. Thank you, Ben, for sharing your insights with us. This white paper package theft in the United States, as well as all other USPS OIG white papers, can be found on the website at www.uspsoig.gov. Thank you for listening.