Christmas is not coming early this year for the U.S. Postal Service, after regulators denied a request Thursday that would have raised the price of a first-class stamp by 2 cents, to 46 cents.
The Postal Service argued that it needed the hike in order to cover lost revenue from a decrease in mail volume, stemming from the economic recession.
While the Postal Regulatory Commission agreed with USPS’ argument, they denied the request, saying that the rate hike was an attempt to address long-term structural problems not caused by the recent recession.
The committee wrote in its unanimous decision that the “Postal Service has failed to meet its burden under the law, and the Commission is unanimous in denying its request for an exigent rate increase.“
While USPS was able to demonstrate that the recession created the kind of “extraordinary or exceptional“ circumstances that would merit the proposed 5.6 percent average increase on mail costs — the requested increase was due to retiree benefits.
“The documentation provided by the Postal Service demonstrated that the primary cause of the liquidity crisis was structural, and related to an overly ambitious requirement for the Postal Service to pre-fund its future retiree health benefit premiums,“ the committee said.
Postal rate hikes are usually capped at the rate of inflation. This is the first time USPS has requested a demand for a price increase, an action that is allowed under the 2006 Postal law.
But as the committee noted, the Postal Service reduced costs by $6 billion in 2009 — a sign that the price cap is forcing the organization to improve efficiency.
Representatives of the U.S. Postal Service were not immediately available for comment.
Oh, bleep. In anticipation of the upcoming increase, I purchased 36 “Forever” stamps. Now they are still worth only 44 cents.
I started paying bills online because of the last rate increase.
Do people still use the postal service?
WastingtonDC: We must adjust postal rates to meet the public needs. One dollar per ounce, for any mailed item, with all mailers paying exactly the same rate. All spam mailers must be required to keep Do Not Mail lists, with $5000 fines for every item mailed to an address entered on the USPO Do Not Mail List, for all junk mailers. Beggars, political criminals, police unions, all junk mailers. Those junk mail criminals mimicking IRS, Bank and other ACTUAL Mail envelopes must be fined a larger fine, as our oldsters, I resemble that remark, shiver in fear of missing the dreaded IRS letter or Clerk of Court, or County Tax Assessor mailing, so we search blindly, forced to carry 25 pounds of junk mail up stairs for searching, then downstairs to pay the city to haul to our overloaded land fills. No more advertising $8.00 special rates for 70 pound boxes, free riding on First Class Mailer’s dime, since it steals lucrative freight from private carriers, and steals fuel, labor and vehicle use from First Class Mail customers, to carry the free shipments, and fund overpaid postal employee perks, benefits, retirement et al. Deliver to all addresses twice a week, with one third of the employees, and no overtime, ever. Work a four day week, and quit doing the stuff you do not need to do. Junk mail is first among the things to quit. Put free email kiosks for customers not owning computer access, with free electronic delivery. Charge $0.50 for physical delivery of emails to postal addresses, still twice per week. Stop all free postal deliveries for congress, and deliver all deployed Pax American Coalition troops personal letters free. It is not rocket science, $1.00 per ounce for all physical mail, two days per week delivery. Let UPS, Fedex, et al, compete for the rest of it.
Maybe if they would stop hiring more managers than they had before the resession then the profit would not be lost so quickly. When they close a shop then those employees are just moved to a new location with a higher pay grade. Paying or (reducing their cost) a company to presort and then resorting it by the USPS costs a lot of revenue. Now let’s look at the cost Saturday’s nationwide and just maybe that would be the smarter way to go. Moving all mail boxes to the sidewalk reduces the time for letter carriers and would aid in the reduction of injuries from hazards of slips, trips, and falls. Finally raise the cost of the mailers that are sending none standard mailers accordingly to the cost of delivery plus.