Critics of reforms under the new postmaster general say he is no longer treating the agency as a public service.
The U.S. Postal Service is rolling out a pilot program seeking to standardize mail delivery times, while leaving more items behind to go out the following day.
The test, which USPS will run at nearly 200 sites around the country, follows a set of policy directives from postal management that sought to crack down on late trips in an effort to reduce labor and transportation costs. The pilots will run for 30-60 days and, for now, affect only city carriers.
The aim of the initiative, labeled Expedited to Street/Afternoon Sortation, is to push mail sorting to the afternoon in order to get letter carriers on their routes earlier in the morning. The city letter carriers are now expected to return to their post offices by 2 p.m., at which point they will sort any new items and mail left behind for delivery the following day. The carriers will sort certain items, such as packages, in the morning prior to beginning their routes. They would also be responsible for taking some of the unsorted mail to be “routed in delivery sequence while on the street.”