Have you seen the news story about the Postmaster General asking the government if they can cut mail delivery back to five days per week?
It’s scary to think about such a big change in something that has been the same every day of our lives. When I heard about a rate increase in some of the services I was wondering how long it would take for them to recommend cutting mail delivery. I don’t know what portion of their cost is for delivery, but undoubtedly it’s huge. I live in a rural area and I know how far they have to drive here to get mail to people.
My mom recently switched to a post office box because someone in her neighborhood was blowing up mailboxes! They haven’t been able to catch the people who are doing it. She was too unnerved to wait around for something to be done about it so now she just stops by the post office to get her mail.
What do you think about this possible change with the mail delivery? Are you okay with it? Do you hate it? Does it make you nervous? Advantages? Pitfalls? If you were Postmaster General how would you save the postal service? Three billion dollar loss… heck yeah, something needs to be done. Tell me your thoughts.
Tags: government, postal service, postmaster general, usps
Wow, I hadn’t heard that.
I think that would have a much more negative impact on the postal service than it would positive. Businesses would stop using the post office, because customers would have to wait even longer for packages to arrive. It would give their competitors a foothold that I don’t think they would recover from.
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It makes me a little sad to be honest. BUT I have also spent a lot of time in line at the PO and some of the gals were talking about 6 days straight and having to deal with some serious nonsense…So…if it keeps things going, I’m for it. I do love mail.
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I think if a day has to go, it should be Tuesdays. Tuesdays are the worst mail day for me… I am lucky to get ONE postcard. A normal day has at least 5 postcards and a letter or two. And I know that at work Tuesdays are slow mail days, and other mail enthusiasts have also noticed that. The post office should be open, just no delivery (though if we had all the money in the world I’d love SEVEN day a week delivery!). I am actually writing to my two senators and representative with my suggestion. I’ll let you know what I hear
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I agree that the impact would be negative. The competitors already have a sound foothold for packages – if I really want to ensure delivery, I use UPS for the tracking number. But, for letters — what would we do without mail delivery?? I am most distressed.
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If it’s just ordinary mail, letters, bills and other junk mail, I really can’t see any reason why they couldn’t cut mail delivery by half and only deliver every other day. However if they don’t have package delivery everyday, even more of it will go to FedEx, UPS and others. This could hurt their bottom line.
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I can totally understand why the US Postal Service is wanting to cut back. The economy is facing serious hardship and practically everyone is having to cut back in all sorts of ways. Think about how many people have not been using the mail system in the past few years because of being able to pay bills online, email, do things like change an address, ect. Technology makes our lives easier, but usually there is at least a small price to pay. The Postal Service is not getting as much revenue in stamps as they use to plus gas prices have increased greatly. We can’t have it all. It will be the taxpayers who will pay for the mail system to remain as it is. Prices for stamps will rise and people will complain about that too. There has to be some give somewhere. Look at the Great Depression. I am sure there were all kinds of sacrifices made until the economy picked back up. We need to look at the whole picture.
Hi there – I have just found your blog and am scouring the older posts just now. How many days a week do you get mail delivered? We have only ever had it 5 days a week here (Australia), weekdays, no weekends. And if you’re in the country, it is usually only twice a week (my grandparents get theirs Tuesday and Friday) – I can’t imagine it any other way, so I guess I think you will be surprised that it really won’t have any impact on you or the postal system in general (apart from cutting their costs) – it just means everyone gets the weekend off (from both posting and receiving). Looking forward to seeing how it pans out though…now back to the posts…
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Hi Natalie, until I read your post it didn’t occur to me that other people didn’t have daily mail delivery. Wow, how egocentric am I?
In America we get mail six days per week. Sunday is the only day we don’t have mail delivery. And the postal service is obligated to deliver the mail to every house that wants mail delivered to it.
Every now and then in our area you will see groupings of mailboxes where all the boxes for a neighborhood are in the same place, but for the most part people get individual delivery to their driveway where we live. I’m not sure exactly how it works in the city.
Also, if you are disabled and you can’t walk or something, the postal carrier has to get out of their car and walk the mail up the driveway to your house if you request that type of special delivery.
I have been always really happy with our mail service here.
I don’t mind the mail dropping back to five days per week if it will keep the rates down.