Talk:United States Postal Service

Operation and budget updates

Hello again! I'm back to suggest a couple changes to the Operation and budget section, in which there are some out-of-date passages. First, at the very top of the section, there are FY21 figures. I'd like to propose those be updated.

Current language:

In Fiscal Year 2021, the Postal Service had $77.06 billion in revenue and expenses of $81.99 billion with a net loss of $4.93 billion.

Suggested language:

In Fiscal Year 2022, the Postal Service had $78.81 billion in revenue and expenses of $79.74 billion. Accounting for savings generated by the Postal Service Reform Act of 2022, the agency reported a net income of $56.04 billion.

And in the subsection about Post office closures, there are some facts from 2012 that are written in present tense. I suggest bringing those into the past tense.

Current language:

Approximately 40% of postal revenue already comes from online purchases or private retail partners including Walmart, Staples, Office Depot, Walgreens, Sam's Club, Costco, and grocery stores.

Suggested language:

In 2012, the Postal Service reported that approximately 40% of postal revenue came from online purchases or private retail partners including Walmart, Staples, Office Depot, Walgreens, Sam's Club, Costco, and grocery stores.

References

If independent editors could review these changes and either implement them or let me know how my suggestions might be improved, I would deeply appreciate it. Thanks! Jonathan with U.S. Postal Service (talk) 14:38, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Those both look like perfect edits to me. Making them now. --FeldBum (talk) 00:36, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

Infobox updates

Hello again! I'm glad my request above was received as helpful. I have a few suggested infobox updates, since some of the figures currently listed are slightly out of date:

• Employees: 635,350 (516,750 career personnel, 118,600 non-career personnel) as of 2022
• Revenue (2022): $78.81 billion
• Net income (2022): $56.04 billion

References

That first number comes from an updated version of the Size and Scope page on the USPS site, and the latter two are from the agency's annual report to Congress. In general, I'm happy to pull from any USPS resources I can track down in order to ensure that the article has accurate facts and figures in it. Thanks! Jonathan with U.S. Postal Service (talk) 13:07, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

 Doing... voorts (talk/contributions) 18:43, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

 Done voorts (talk/contributions) 18:47, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

Thank you so much for implementing the update! Jonathan with U.S. Postal Service (talk) 22:42, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

Proposing Delivering for America subsection

Hello! I'm back on this Talk page to propose an all-new Delivering for America subsection. There's currently nothing in the article about DFA, a 10-year reform plan launched in March 2021. It includes a $40 billion capital investment and rather significant changes to USPS's operations, so I thought it might be worth covering at some length. I've put together a draft for this section and uploaded it to my user page. Link here.

Obviously, editors should closely review the text and the references, but just to give people a sense of what's included, I'll briefly summarize what the draft covers:

• Launch of program and USPS's stated intentions
• $40 billion capital investment
• New expedited parcel delivery services
• Expansion of USPS parcel-sorting capacity under DFA plan
• Planned construction of 60 large regional processing and distribution centers
• Budget deficit reduction through postage rate increases, operational reforms, and passage of the Postal Service Reform Act of 2022
• Measures USPS has taken to reduce employee turnover and stabilize its career workforce

I think this subsection would fit well at the bottom of the Operation and budget section, below the Coronavirus pandemic and voting by mail subsection. I've done my best to use solid sourcing and organize the information coherently, but as ever, I'm open to independent editor feedback. Happy to refine a passage, track down better sourcing, clarify language, etc. Thanks! Jonathan with U.S. Postal Service (talk) 18:12, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Hi Jonathan. It's a bit large and seems to include some unnecessary info that might not be considered WP:DUE....

"In March 2021, the Postal Service launched a 10-year reform plan called Delivering for America, intended to improve the agency's financial stability, service reliability, and operational efficiency. The plan includes $40 billion in investments meant to improve USPS technology and facilities.

As part of Delivering for America, the Postal Service introduced the USPS Connect offering in June 2022 and USPS Ground Advantage in July 2023. Together, these offerings have expanded expedited parcel shipping options for the agency's customers. Between Delivering for America's inception and September 2023, USPS installed 348 new package sorting machines within its facilities. As of September 2023, the Postal Service is able to process approximately 70 million packages per day, up from 53 million in 2021, and 60 million in 2022.

USPS announced in July 2022 that it would be building 60 new regional processing and distribution centers in order to replace smaller, redundant facilities. The first of these new facilities is a million-square foot building in Atlanta that, as of March 2023, is under construction.

In May 2023, the Postal Service announced that its Delivering for America initiatives had cut the agency's projected losses through 2031 from $160 billion to $70 billion. Losses are projected to go down due to postage rate increases, improved operational efficiency from the consolidation of its delivery network, and the passage Postal Service Reform Act of 2022, which lifted financial burdens placed on the Postal Service by the 2006 Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act.

Under the Delivering for America plan, USPS has focused on reducing employee turnover. The Postal Service has also sought to reduce its reliance on seasonal employees by stabilizing the size of its career workforce. Between October 2020 and September 2023, the Postal Service converted 150,000 of its pre-career workers into full-time employees."

I would suggest a shorter version, removing the parts in bold and restructuring a bit, in order to gather more support for this change. I would also use some attributions to avoid violating WP:VOICE. Cheers. DN (talk) 22:03, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

I would add that when there is a request to add text to an article, that text needs to be posted verbatim on the article's talk page. COI edit requests should exist on the talk page as a permanent record of what has been requested to be added or deleted. Placing the requested text in a draft page that the COI editor ultimately controls does not satisfy this guideline. The only permanent record we have of the above request is a portion of the proposed text added by the reviewing editor as part of their review. Other than that, it is anybody's guess what is being proposed here, should the COI editor decide (however unlikely that may be) to delete their draft — an action which, because they control that draftspace — is something that remains in the realm of possibility. Concerns about the length of the the additions and heading formatting are easily handled with {{collapse}} and {{fake heading}} templates.

Notes

Regards,  Spintendo  19:00, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

Hey, DN! Thanks so much for the helpful feedback. I've taken your suggestions into account and reworked the section. Per another editor's feedback above, I'll put both my initial and the revised versions of the section draft here:

Delivering for America (initial version)

In March 2021, the Postal Service launched a 10-year reform plan called Delivering for America, intended to improve the agency's financial stability, service reliability, and operational efficiency. The plan includes $40 billion in investments meant to improve USPS technology and facilities. As part of Delivering for America, the Postal Service introduced the USPS Connect offering in June 2022 and USPS Ground Advantage in July 2023. Together, these offerings have expanded expedited parcel shipping options for the agency's customers. Between Delivering for America's inception and September 2023, USPS installed 348 new package sorting machines within its facilities. As of September 2023, the Postal Service is able to process approximately 70 million packages per day, up from 53 million in 2021, and 60 million in 2022. USPS announced in July 2022 that it would be building 60 new regional processing and distribution centers in order to replace smaller, redundant facilities. The first of these new facilities is a million-square foot building in Atlanta that, as of March 2023, is under construction. In May 2023, the Postal Service announced that its Delivering for America initiatives had cut the agency's projected losses through 2031 from $160 billion to $70 billion. Losses are projected to go down due to postage rate increases, improved operational efficiency from the consolidation of its delivery network, and the passage Postal Service Reform Act of 2022, which lifted financial burdens placed on the Postal Service by the 2006 Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act. Under the Delivering for America plan, USPS has focused on reducing employee turnover. The Postal Service has also sought to reduce its reliance on seasonal employees by stabilizing the size of its career workforce. Between October 2020 and September 2023, the Postal Service converted 150,000 of its pre-career workers into full-time employees. References

Delivering for America (revised version)

In March 2021, the Postal Service launched a 10-year reform plan called Delivering for America, intended to improve the agency's financial stability, service reliability, and operational efficiency. The plan includes $40 billion in investments meant to improve USPS technology and facilities. In April 2022, the Postal Service Reform Act of 2022 was signed into law. The bill was described by the Washington Post as a "key component of DeJoy’s 10-year plan for the Postal Service to avert a projected $160 billion loss over the next decade". It lifted financial burdens placed on the USPS by the 2006 Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act. As part of Delivering for America, the Postal Service has introduced two new parcel shipping offerings: USPS Connect in June 2022 and USPS Ground Advantage in July 2023. It has also installed 348 new package sorting machines within its facilities. As of September 2023, the Postal Service is able to process approximately 70 million packages per day, up from 53 million in 2021, and 60 million in 2022. The USPS announced in July 2022 that it would be building 60 new regional processing and distribution centers in order to replace smaller, redundant facilities. In an effort to stabilize its workforce, the Postal Service converted 150,000 of its pre-career workers into full-time employees between October 2020 and September 2023. References

As you can see, I cut most of what you suggested. I see your point about the initial version being a little bit gratuitous. Two notes on specific changes:

• Per your attribution suggestion, I added a quote from a Washington Post article describing the Postal Service Reform Act as an important part of the DFA plan
• I condensed the passage on the Postal Service stabilizing its workforce. I realize my first crack at describing it was too long, but 150,000 part-time workers being moved into full-time positions feels significant enough to include. USPS employs about half a million people, so 150k is a large percentage of its workforce. I'll defer to you, since you're the indepedent editor, but I'm just asking that you reconsider the inclusion of that fact.

I'll now step aside and let DN, or any other independent editors, judge the revised draft. I hope what I've put together now fits the site's content guidelines, but if further changes need to be discussed, I'm available. Thanks! Jonathan with U.S. Postal Service (talk) 19:56, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

Asking for correction in During Trump administration section

Hello! I'd like to ask that a sentence under the During the Trump administration subsection be corrected. The sentence currently says this:

In May 2020, in a controversial move, President Trump appointed Louis DeJoy, the first postmaster general in the last two decades who did not emerge from the postal bureaucracy.

The bit about Trump appointing DeJoy is incorrect. The Postmaster General is appointed by the USPS Board of Governors, not the President. I'll suggest an alternate phrasing (and a source) that keeps every other part of the sentence intact:

In May 2020, in a controversial move, the bipartisan USPS Board of Governors appointed Louis DeJoy, the first postmaster general in the last two decades who did not emerge from the postal bureaucracy.

References

Again, my intention here is not to alter tone or dispute the "experience" claim. I just want to fix that one factual error. Any help I can get with this request would be much appreciated. Thank you! Jonathan with U.S. Postal Service (talk) 11:19, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

 Done with some minor changes. I left out "bipartisan," and replaced "USPS Board of Governors" with "Board of Governors of the United States Postal Service." ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 14:53, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

That seems very reasonable. Thank you so much for evaluating and implementing the request, I appreciate it. Jonathan with U.S. Postal Service (talk) 18:24, 11 October 2023 (UTC)