Fall 2024 Semiannual Report to Congress
The Office of Inspector General is tasked with ensuring efficiency, accountability, and integrity in the U.S. Postal Service. We also have the distinct mission of helping to maintain confidence in the mail and postal system, as well as to improve the Postal Service's bottom line. We use audits and investigations to help protect the integrity of the Postal Service. Our Semiannual Report to Congress presents a snapshot of the work we did to fulfill our mission for the six-month period ending September 30, 2024. Our dynamic report format provides readers with easy access to facts and information, as well as succinct summaries of the work by area. Links are provided to the full reports featured in this report, as well as to the appendices.
A Message from the Inspector General
Over the past six months, our work has covered a wide range of topics, with a strong focus on the U.S. Postal Service’s rollout of its 10-year Delivering for America (DFA) plan. We have identified some significant complications and potential risks associated with its implementation. As the Postal Service continues to make nationwide changes to how it collects, transports, and processes mail, our audit team will be there to highlight issues and provide postal leadership with recommendations to mitigate current and future problems.
While our investigative team covers many areas, it continues to have a big focus on both narcotics in the mail and mail theft by postal employees. There has always been a small handful of postal employees who turn to crime, but recently there has been a growing threat. Criminal organizations are targeting, recruiting, and colluding with postal employees to move narcotics through the postal network and to steal checks — both personal and government-issued checks — credit cards, and other valuables from the mail.
This is a critical time for the Postal Service and its customers. Proper oversight is essential to ensuring the nation continues to receive affordable and reliable mail service, especially during an election. During the six-month period ending September 30, 2024, we issued 82 audit reports, management advisories, and white papers, and identified over $442 million in questioned costs. Postal management agreed with 220 (88 percent) of our recommendations to improve issues we identified. We completed 1,393 investigations that led to 401 arrests, 351 convictions, and almost $19 million in fines, restitution, and recoveries, of which more than $11 million was returned to the Postal Service.
We have achieved these significant results with an efficient, lean staff, which equates to one OIG employee for every 648 postal workers. Unfortunately, our ability to maintain this level of effort is being challenged, as the combination of a relatively flat budget and the growing cost of federal salaries and benefits has led to a decline in the number of full-time employees. As the Postal Service gets ready to make significant nationwide changes, and the threats of narcotics trafficking and mail theft continue to grow, additional funding would help ensure we can continue to provide the right level of oversight.
Looking towards the future, in September, we released our five-year Strategic Plan covering fiscal years 2025 through 2029. It lays out how we plan to meet our mission — promoting the integrity, accountability, and efficiency of the U.S. Postal Service and its regulator, the Postal Regulatory Commission — with a focus on innovation and employee development.
While the future ahead holds challenges, I look forward to the important work we will continue to do for the Postal Service and the people it serves.
Tammy L. Hull
Inspector General, United States Postal Service