The U.S. Postal Service is not living up to its projected cost savings from its plan to overhaul the agency, according to a new audit, which found the 10-year initiative is no longer offering insight for measuring the success of the reforms.
USPS is bringing in more revenue than it anticipated when it first laid out its Delivering for America plan in 2021, though its costs have also accelerated in a way it did not project. That has led to overall losses of $950 million in fiscal 2022 and $6.5 billion in fiscal 2023, despite postal management predicting it would have broken even by now.
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy initially suggested his plan generate $160 billion through revenue improvements and cost savings that included new business, cost increases, changes to the delivery network and legislative overhauls. In a new report, the USPS inspector general faulted DeJoy’s team for failing to specify the cost savings associated with each initiative or providing updates on its efforts that detail how costs would be cut.