Saturday Mail Delivery to End, Postal Service Says
The U.S. Postal Service announced that it will end Saturday mail delivery by Aug. 1. Speak out: How will this affect you?
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Calling the six-days-per-week mail delivery business model "no longer sustainable," the U.S. Postal Service announced on Wednesday that it will eliminate Saturday delivery of mail by Aug. 1.
The plan to change delivery from six days per week to five would only affect first-class mail, however. Packages, mail-order medicines and priority and express mail would still be delivered on Saturdays, and local post offices will remain open for business on Saturdays, including the ones at Caste Village and Brentwood Towne Square.
According to the postal service, the reasons for this decision are continued economic struggles and the increasing use of the Internet by consumers for communications and bill-paying. The postal service is also the only federal agency required to pre-fund health benefits for retirees, and those costs are escalating quickly.
"Our current business model of delivering mail six days a week is no longer sustainable," the postal service states on its website. "We must change in order to remain an integral part of the American community for decades to come."
Saturday is the lightest mail delivery day by volume, and many businesses are closed on Saturdays, according to the postal service. However, many residents receive print magazines and ads in the mail on Saturdays, and those deliveries may be shifted to another day.
A Rasmussen poll on mail delivery in 2012 showed "Three-out-of-four Americans (75%) would prefer the U.S. Postal Service cut mail delivery to five days a week rather than receive government subsidies to cover ongoing losses."
A USA Today/Gallup poll in 2010 found that the majority of U.S. residents surveyed were OK with eliminating Saturday delivery. The March 2010 telephone survey of 999 adults revealed people aged 55 and older were more likely than younger people to have used the mail to pay a bill or send a letter in the most recent two weeks.
Speak out: How will this change affect you? Will you miss getting mail on Saturdays?
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Tyrion Lannister
11:00 am on Wednesday, February 6, 2013
It's tough to have sympathy when the ratio of "junk-mail" to "mail I actually want/need to receive" is about 100-1 and climbing. But the USPS makes a lot more $$$ from the pre-sort junk-mail than any mail I actually need, so that won't change. I would settle for ONE day per week delivery IF they stopped the never-ending avalanche of unsolicited garbage mail.
Kristy Tagg
7:26 pm on Thursday, February 7, 2013
It's fine, I get to enjoy the weekend instead of opening up bills
cc
11:41 pm on Thursday, February 7, 2013
Instead of cutting out Saturdays service the post office needs to keep a better watch on the people who deliver mail. We get our mail delivered around 3:30 - 4 pm every day. Our mail man will tell you that he goes home for a few hours during the day either to take a nap (winter) or summer smells like chlorine as in the summer months he will go home and swim for a few hours instead of getting his mail delivered.
NE12Ukid
7:15 pm on Wednesday, February 13, 2013
Cutting Saturday deliveries is a small adjustment, no big problem IMO.