12/12/2020 USPS Delivery - Apocalypse Now!

 

 

To understand the problem the USPS is having, here's a simplified explanation. Every day, letters and parcels are picked up at residences and businesses, transferred to a local post office where they are unloaded, sorted, then loaded, delivered to big sorting facilities, transferred in 53 foot tractor trailers, unloaded, sorted, reloaded, transferred to a destination sorting facility, sorted, transferred to a local post office, sorted, and then delivered.

Now imagine one of these big sorting facilities has just one unloading position. They have a lot more than that, but to illustrate, imagine there's just one. Three shifts of three employees each unload 53 footers at that position, and it takes 3-1/2 hours for them to offload each one. They can handle just about 7 a day. Ten employees are assigned the position each day, 3 shifts of 3 and a supervisor. Now imagine 40% of the employees are absent, for whatever reason. Instead of three employees per shift, they only have two. Overtime! So each of the remaining 6, including the supervisor, work 12 hour shifts, getting them back to 3 per shift, or a capacity of 7 trailers unloaded per day. The employees can't do that indefinitely, but for a short span of a few days they can. Except instead of 7 trailers a day, they're receiving 10 to 15 per day. It's physically impossible. Each day the backlog of work increases. If this goes on for days and weeks, which it has, it becomes a logjam that only time and manpower can fix.

Multiply the problem times all of the pickups, loading positions, unloading positions, sorting, transfers, and deliveries they're getting nationwide. If you're screaming at your mailman, and there are people who are doing just that, you're not being fair. Travel and gathering restrictions imposed due to the virus, restrictions that were NOT imposed by the USPS, but by mayors and governors, has people sending many, even most of the gifts they would normally give in person by mail. Covid and exhaustion has the post office dealing with high absenteeism on top of the massive shipping surge. It's a perfect storm, a delivery failure apocalypse. But if driving to the local post office and screaming at the clerk selling stamps and tendering packages makes you feel a lot better, have at it. And blaming Trump is just as stupid. But have at it. I hope you feel better now.