LETTER DAYS Final days before USPS changes go into...

THE US Postal Service is set to roll out a number of changes and Americans could end up waiting longer to receive certain types of mail.

The USPS will begin to phase in its latest changes starting April 1.

Service standards for first-class mail, periodicals, marketing mail, and package services will all be adjusted to save an expected $36 billion over 10 years, per USPS.

According to the company, the majority of first-class mail customers won’t notice a difference in delivery service.

However, 11% of customers will experience slower delivery times.

Despite any potential delays, the agency said all deliveries would happen between one and five days.

Under the new changes, postal workers can leave facilities earlier to travel longer distances to deliver mail.

Allowing workers to leave early will help improve postal reliability for customers living in rural areas, per USPS.

However, customers will see delays in their mail delivery when they drop off packages.

USPS will no longer count Saturdays or the day before a holiday as a transit day for packages.

That means all packages mailed on those days will take an extra day to arrive at their destination.

The USPS said 75% of First-Class Mail will retain its current service standards and that 14% of First-Class Mail will see an improvement in delivery times.

At the same time, 11% of First-Class Mail will experience slightly longer delivery times.

And, zipcodes will be changed to use a five-digit regional add-on.

The changes follow bad financial years for the post office.

Despite generating $79 billion in revenue in 2023, the USPS lost $6.5 billion.

Louis DeJoy, who was Postmaster General at the USPS, resigned suddenly on Monday after almost five years at the helm.

It’s thought DeJoy resigned before Donald Trump could fire him, according to the Wall Street Journal.

DeJoy had turned to the Department of Government Efficiency to help revive the agency after it reported heavy losses.

DeJoy asked for help centering leases for USPS’s post offices, warning that “future difficulties we will face in their renewal because of ownership consolidation, urban development, and general increases in rental rates when decades-long leases expire.”

He also highlighted counterfeit postage, which costs USPS $1 billion annually, and federal laws burdening the Postal Service.

Finally, DeJoy noted that regulatory restrictions have added $50 billion in losses.

In conjunction with DOGE, the USPS announced it would be cutting around 10,000 jobs by using an early retirement program.

Select employees would be offered $15,000 for taking their retirement early – a move that’s expected to save the agency billions.

In a letter to Congress, DeJoy wrote, “DOGE is the only other game in town that seems oriented toward helping us to achieve our efficiency and cost goals.”

The postmaster warned that the USPS is a “broken organization,” and a lot needs to be done to fix it.

“Fixing a broken organization that had experienced close to $100 billion in losses and was projected to lose another $200 billion, without a bankruptcy proceeding, is a daunting task,” he admitted.

“Fixing a heavily legislated and overly regulated organization as massive, important, cherished, misunderstood and debated as the United States Postal Service, with such a broken business model, is even more difficult.”

DeJoy, who was appointed postmaster general in 2020, had previously said he would be leaving at an undisclosed date.

That date came on Monday.

“It has been one of the pleasures of my life and a crowning achievement of my career to have been associated with this cherished institution,” he said.

The changes come as mail carriers are also being floated to take on even more work, with a proposal to use them to conduct the US Census in addition to delivering mail.

The move could violate the law and has raised even more fears of increased delivery problems and overstretched workers.