Mail Delivery Delays Continue Across The Country

[left-of-center2012]

You've got mail. Somewhere. Probably.

The U.S. Postal Service is still digging out from under an avalanche of mail sent during the recent holiday season. But for much of the past year the postal system has been strained by the impact of COVID-19 on its workflow and workforce.

In addition, operational changes ostensibly designed to stop the system from hemorrhaging money helped create a backlog of mail. And the head of the Postal Service pledges that more changes in the name of cost savings are coming soon.

Union officials estimate as many as 14,500 postal employees are currently under quarantine.

When Postmaster General Louis DeJoy took over last summer, he vowed to make the service more efficient and cost-effective. DeJoy moved to slash overtime and accelerate mothballing sorting machines.

He also required letter carriers to begin deliveries at a specific time each day and not return to a post office (for mire mail), even if it meant leaving some mail stranded.

https://www.npr.org/2021/01/22/959273022/theres-no-end-in-sight-mail-delivery-delays-continue-across-the-country

[still_one]

1. They need to find a way to get rid of Louis DeJoy

[Squinch]

2. It's been three days. I am guessing this is on the list.

[Frustratedlady]

3. I was just wondering earlier this week if DeJoy was going to keep his job?

I understand Pres. Biden can't fire him, but I should think his performance would be enough for the board or whatever group can carry it out would act soon.

I'm still waiting for packages to be delivered from the holidays. Fat chance.

[ok_cpu]

4. We got a Christmas card last week. Postmarked 12/12. n/t

[bottomofthehill]

7. Same here. 4 cards arrived last week

1 postmarked on Dec 14
2 postmarked on Dec 15
1 postmarked on Dec 16

Over 30 days to go about 400 miles. The pony express could have delivered faster.

[Best_man23]

10. Same here, Christmas card postmarked in IL on 12/8

Arrived on 1/21.

[Galileo126]

5. Charge all late fees to DeJoy

I've been battling with various companies for being charged late fees. So far, I've been successful in getting them rescinded. But I have to call the EVERY MONTH!

I asked that the (all) send the late fee charges to the current postmaster general. Not that it will change anything, but a statement of personal responsibility. And, that businesses are hurting from DeJoy's business model. The USPS is a SERVICE, not a business....

Fuck DeJoy!

-g

[no_hypocrisy]

8. And defamation re your credit history

for involuntary late payments.

[Roisin Ni Fiachra]

6. Federal judge halts changes to Postal Service, citing 'voter disenfranchisement'

Not an attorney, but how is this not a crime that DeJoy cannot be prosecuted for? Or at the very least be grounds for dismissal?

Sept 18 2020

A federal judge in Washington State ordered the U.S. Postal Service to halt a set of controversial cost-cutting changes imposed earlier this year by Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, handing a major victory to several Democratic state attorneys general.

U.S. Judge Stanley Bastian wrote Thursday that "partisan politics" was the root cause of the Postal Service’s cost-cutting measures and "voter disenfranchisement" was the effect. He found that the state attorneys general proved "that the United States Postal Service and the Postmaster General violated and infringed on the States’ constitutional authority to regulate elections and the people’s right to vote."
...........
"It is easy to conclude that the recent Postal Services’ changes is an intentional effort on the part the current administration to disrupt and challenge the legitimacy of upcoming local, state, and federal elections," Bastian wrote. "Plaintiffs have made a strong showing that the recent changes are the result of an effort by the current administration to use the Postal Service as a tool in partisan politics."
.........
Notably, Bastian ordered that any post office or facility having trouble meeting first-class delivery standards "because of the Postal Service’s recent removal and decommissioning of equipment" must have its equipment restored. The matter must be brought before the court, the judge said, if the Postal Service rejects the request to bring equipment back online.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/federal-judge-halts-postal-service-citing-voter-disenfranchisement/story?id=73094981

18 U.S. Code § 1703 - Delay or destruction of mail or newspapers

(a) Whoever, being a Postal Service officer or employee, unlawfully secretes, destroys, detains, delays, or opens any letter, postal card, package, bag, or mail entrusted to him or which shall come into his possession, and which was intended to be conveyed by mail, or carried or delivered by any carrier or other employee of the Postal Service, or forwarded through or delivered from any post office or station thereof established by authority of the Postmaster General or the Postal Service, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.

(b) Whoever, being a Postal Service officer or employee, improperly detains, delays, or destroys any newspaper, or permits any other person to detain, delay, or destroy the same, or opens, or permits any other person to open, any mail or package of newspapers not directed to the office where he is employed; or

Whoever, without authority, opens, or destroys any mail or package of newspapers not directed to him, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.

(June 25, 1948, ch. 645, 62 Stat. 778; May 24, 1949, ch. 139, § 37, 63 Stat. 95; Pub. L. 91–375, § 6(j)(16), Aug. 12, 1970, 84 Stat. 778; Pub. L. 103–322, title XXXIII, § 330016(1)(B), (G), Sept. 13, 1994, 108 Stat. 2146, 2147.)

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1703

[keithbvadu2]

9. Surely there must be a cost benefit analysis to make such a business decision. Let's see it.

Throwing away mail sorting machines and going back to manual labor.

Surely there must be a cost benefit analysis to make such a business decision. Let's see it.

[rickford66]

11. The Betsy DeVos of the USPS

DeJoy is a saboteur.