Data Show Decline In USPS Mail Service (From Linn’s Stamp News)

Lexington’s Paul Steidler was featured in a Linn’s Stamp News article about the sharp deterioration in mail service. The piece cited Steidler’s January 22 report on the Lexington Institute website, where he documented that mail service “is worse than it has been in decades.” Steidler said the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) “delivered just 64 percent of first-class mail within its target delivery times” during the week ending on December 26. The Christmas season saw, in his words, “the utter obliteration of first-class mail service standards.”

However, packages were a different story. Steidler noted that ShipMatrix, a firm that rates delivery times, reported a 94.7 percent on-time delivery rate for USPS packages during the week of Dec. 20-26, in comparison to 63.87 per cent of first-class mail during the same period. USPS is by law supposed to prioritize mail delivery over the delivery of packages.

Read the full article here.