USPS wants to limit next-day service (Put a fork in 'em! They're Done!)

cnn ^ | 12/3/2011 | By Jennifer Liberto

[muawiyah]

The courts and Congress did ages ago with the Private Express Statutes.

Here's a thought for you ~ let's say Texas had its own postal service, as did Rhode Island.

Just think on that for a while.

[dinodino]

Sounds ok to me.

[muawiyah]

All sounds good. My own plan for privatization does something a little different than you might imagine. First off, Congress gets all the debt. Secondly my new operation gets to operate as a fully private firm so the first thing we do is a leveraged buy-out of both UPS and Fed-Ex.

Door delivery is abolished, and even curbside delivery will be abolished in urban locations where we can install kiosks. If you want delivery you will pay a fee for that ~ just like in France.

All those little rural post offices (almost all ~ 28,000 of them anyway) will be abolished and we'll trace out an optimized network called the Preferential Mail Network. That should leave us with about 105 mail processing centers exclusive of a "standard mail" network.

USPS is currently cutting 250 mail processing centers ~ which is why service will decline. You have to eliminate your most costly, least efficient centers ~ not just those that satisfy untested considerations regarding network travel opportunities. Once you whack the cost out of the system you improve service times within the NEW NETWORKS.

Let's say you want early delivery ~ because your business depends on the mail ~ and with service time reductions you really suffer.

I'd put you on a special route that delivers everything that's worked up by 8 AM to YOU FIRST for a fee. Figure 10 to 15 customers per route who might well benefit from that service, a quite profitable early delivery option is quite feasible. Barcode Sorting Systems allow for this BTW. No reason to not do it.

There are some other things to be done, but I think you get the gist of it ~

I doubt a local circular delivery service acting on its own could beat my price ~ which, in any case, is already true.

[muawiyah]

It was Greyhound. Somebody (50 states acting in concert) regulated the pee out of the private bus systems ~ and turned all the business over to the airlines.

That turned the airlines into bus systems.

They don't land everywhere BTW.

[Atlas Sneezed]

The courts and Congress did ages ago with the Private Express Statutes.

Here’s a thought for you ~ let’s say Texas had its own postal service, as did Rhode Island.

Just think on that for a while.

---

You’re dodging the issue that there is no mandate for a federal post office.

[muawiyah]

The Founders certainly thought there was ~ they set it up. I didn’t set it up.

[Ciexyz]

I ordered an ipad from Amazon.com and it was shipped by USPS for $6.95 and arrived in perfect condition in my cluster mail box. Works for me.

[SoCal Pubbie]

Okay, muawiyah, as a former Postal employee you do have real knowledge on this subject. Here's my plan to save the Post office. Have at it at as you will.

Eliminate all services except first class mail, and maybe whatever rate the junk mail gets sent. Tell UPS and FedEx we're handing over all our overnight customers to you, so you damned well better find a way to serve rural customers at a decent rate.

Make mail delivery once a week. If you want it slow and cheap, send it by the Post Office. Otherwise, use a private firm.

Your thoughts?

[muawiyah]

UPS and FedEx are simply common carriers ~ they currently are not required by federal or state laws to carry everywhere. In fact, if a state were to require that standard they'd pull out of the state.

What you're talking about is UNIVERSAL SERVICE as required by law. It's backed by 50 US Senators ~ not likely that's going to change any time soon.

First Class mail cannot, at any price, justify the current Postal Establishment. You'd get down to weekly delivery. There are a whole lot of US Congresscritters who'd be PO'd like you wouldn't believe.

The USPS is simply the latest manifestation of the demiurge located in the heart and bowels of every politician to COMMUNICATE WITH THE PEEPS.

We can only do that which is legally and politically possible. That's why eliminating Door Delivery is possible ~ the people getting it today are mostly "THE RICH" and those who live in slums!

Neither group is very popular so it's time to go after the good stuff they get that is denied to others.

I see Kiosks in the future of both the richest and poorest Americans~!

[muawiyah]

The PAEA, without amending the provisions of the Postal Reorganization Act, cannot levy such costs on USPS.

That's probably why the Postal Rate Commission has not allowed USPS to count those costs as a basis for rate making.

Basically you have a Mexican standoff between The US SENATE and THE PRC. The House really isn't in this one ~ Goober doesn't have a clue.

[SoCal Pubbie]

“You’d get down to weekly delivery”

Which is exactly what I propose.

[muawiyah]

Once a week delivery won’t happen. Congress is in the way.

[Fledermaus]

I’ve always hated that blatant lie. Jim Henson Productions could pay the full boat of the budget to produce Sesame Street and should.

They are benefiting from government sponsorship when they earn millions upon millions.

[Fledermaus]

Did you bother to calculate into your “savings” the cost to all taxpayers to subsidize your packages?

The USPS doesn’t make money so the taxpayers pick up the difference.