Background
Each year, the U.S. Postal Service experiences an increase in package volume during peak mailing season — Thanksgiving through New Year’s Eve — which can significantly strain the Postal Service’s processing and distribution networks. To help handle this increase, the Postal Service creates peak season initiatives. These initiatives are meant to help the Postal Service have the right amount of personnel, resources, and package capacity throughout its processing, transportation, and delivery networks to address weather and increased volume conditions in facilities.
What We Did
We evaluated the Postal Service’s preparedness for the fiscal year (FY) 2025 peak season. We also conducted fieldwork at processing and distribution centers and associated offices to assess best practices and lessons learned from past peak preparations.
What We Found
We found the Postal Service developed its FY 2025 peak season preparedness initiatives to build upon the successes it had during prior peak seasons. Specifically, the Postal Service’s FY 2025 peak season initiatives spanned multiple functions, including processing and distribution, logistics, and retail and delivery operations.
In processing, we identified the increase in packages — especially the growing number of manually processed, oversized packages that require more space in facilities — as one risk to peak season operations. To mitigate this risk, processing and distribution operations are using new facilities and clearing floor space in existing facilities for package staging and to deploy new, larger capacity machines, to increase the percentage of machinable packages. In logistics, we identified risks related to changing contracts for air capacity and moving more package volume to surface transportation. To mitigate these risks, logistics will use pre-planned trucks, conduct simulations, and develop an option to use mass solicitations for additional drivers. In delivery and retail, there is a risk of too little space, too few employees, and too few vehicles to deliver the increased mail volume. To mitigate this, retail and delivery operations has a plan to identify sites that may need additional resources, a plan to create extra package runs, and options to rent additional truck and facility space.
Recommendations and Management’s Comments
If the Postal Service’s initiatives are implemented as planned and volume forecasts are accurate, it should be prepared for peak season; therefore, we did not issue a recommendation. While we did not make a recommendation, the Postal Service agreed with our finding that if initiatives are implemented as planned and volume forecasts are accurate, it should be prepared for peak season.
