U.S. Postal Service’s Response to Mail Theft
Background
The mission of the U.S. Postal Service is to provide the nation with trusted, safe, and secure mail services. As the Postal Service provides mail service to almost 153 million customers six days a week, carrier robberies and mail theft are on the rise across the nation. The Postal Service’s role in the development of strategic and technical solutions to address mail theft is critical to combat these incidents. More specifically, the efforts of the Postal Inspection Service, an investigative agency within the Postal Service, to prioritize investigations and customer complaints about alleged mail theft and submit cases for prosecution are key to addressing this rising problem.
What We Did
Our objective was to evaluate the Postal Service’s efforts to respond to mail theft. For this audit, we reviewed processes and procedures for addressing mail theft, management of arrow keys, and mail theft complaints, investigations, and carrier robberies from October 1, 2020, through September 30, 2022, for five Postal Inspection Service divisions: Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, and Washington, DC.
What We Found
The Postal Service is working to prevent mail theft by deploying more secure mail collection boxes and implementing initiatives for enhanced security around their universal mail keys, called arrow keys. However, we found they do not have deployment timelines with actionable milestones to fully implement planned initiatives to address mail theft. We also found that the Postal Service lacks accountability for their arrow keys, which are often a target in carrier robberies and are used to commit mail theft. Additionally, while the Postal Inspection Service implemented efforts to address mail theft and is working to finalize a mail theft strategy, we found they face challenges with staffing and have not assessed and assigned personnel resources nationally to address this issue. We also found that postal inspectors who solely worked mail theft cases are not required to complete specialized training. Lastly, the Postal Inspection Service did not clearly define the purpose of its Mail Theft Analytics Program. We calculated the Postal Service could use over $1 million more effectively in fiscal years 2023 and 2024 if the purpose of the program was clarified around its efforts to analyze mail theft complaints.
Recommendations
We made seven recommendations, including that management develop a plan with actionable milestones to implement planned initiatives to address mail theft, establish guidance for employees to fulfill arrow key accountability requirements, finalize their Mail Theft Strategy, assess Postal Inspection Service staffing at an agency-wide level, require specialized training for postal inspectors assigned to investigate mail theft, and develop a purpose and metrics for the Mail Theft Analytics Program.