Running a side business assisting candidates with mail, and one of the first thing I have to point out is that not only is mail more expensive to do this year, the timelines from when mail goes in, to when it shows up in mailboxes is insane. What used to take 2 days… now plan for a week.
So when Senator Mike Rounds points these things out – it’s well worth repeating because he’s 100% correct. The US Postal service needs to fix this mess:
You guys should defund it more and force it to fund 2 pensions for every employee in their entirety. That will surely kill it.
No kidding, Rounds holds a bloody knife behind his back while asking “who did this?”
The leopard ate all of their faces
Nobody could’ve seen this coming.
About damn time somebody gets passionate about this. And don’t forget how Sioux Falls had all of its remote sites closed too.
Apparently, I can order something from Amazon, return it and get a replacement… twice… before the mail gets delivered.
This is what happens when society rewards incompetence with participation trophies.
The problem is not limited to the USPS. We are encountering it everywhere.
Last month FedEx tracking told both me and my neighbor that packages were “out for delivery” 4 days in a row. Trail cameras showed a FedEX truck going by without stopping on the 4th day, so we both got busy reporting this to customer service bots which was an adventure in itself. On the 5th day the driver dumped all 6 packages next to our mailboxes.
UPS has caused so much destruction we don’t want their drivers within a mile of our house so we pick everything up at the UPS store. A box of medical supplies disappeared last summer. It was labelled “1 of 2;” the box labeled “2 of 2” was delivered as scheduled but nobody at UPS could track “1 of 2.” It was easier for Caremark to ship another box than to get UPS to figure out where it went.
Or, when an unqualified sycophant is given an important position in a government agency.
I believe you are referring to Bill Clinton’s termination of the Interstate Commerce Commission in 1995,
The wide-eyed “how could this happen” innocent act is really tedious and it’s disappointing that Rounds would take this path. The better path would be to stay silent.
The beginning of the destruction of the postal service dates back to Trump’s first term when the appointed head of USPS turned out to be a person with a vested interest in privatizing the industry and shutting USPS down.
At the end of the day, Senator, we pay in our tax dollars, whether in person, or whether through billionaires forced to pay taxes on the money they earn FROM US. THROUGH US. Thus we EXPECT government to spend money on SERVICE, whether it’s mail, or social services, or programs to address poverty, improve education or fund medical research. Note that I have listed things which were fine last Jan 19th, but began being drastically reduced or eliminated on Jan 20th. We have seen Republicans rip this service and good use of tax dollars FROM US and take many many burdens off the poor billionaires backs, so that they might keep the profits they reap from us and not be burdened by the taxes they should pay.
I spent so many years considering you to be a great governor, and a great senator, and certainly a person who in my estimation could serve well as a president of this country. I certainly think you could out-president the current criminal-in-chief, but know that I remain continually chagrined by the horrible path of the Republican Party, and these occasions where you are truly tone-deaf to the largest realities.
Senator Rounds is correct about the boondoggle that is the USPS. I live in a small town in SD, mailed a payment to a relative in a small town in SD 90 miles away. It took 15 days for the payment to be delivered. 15 days to go 90 miles.
If the biggest concern is the shipment of medication to veterans, the VA could just contract with a different carrier to deliver it. Caremark, which manages the Federal Employee Plan, is shipping drugs with UPS . I have been getting monthly shipments for over 5 years and only one package of supplies has gotten lost. We just don’t want their crazy drivers in our neighborhood, so we pick everything up at the UPS store. Home delivery is still an option for people who don’t mind trucks going 80 mph on gravel roads, blasting loose sand and gravel everywhere and running over pets and livestock.
If the Federal employees and retirees can get their drugs via UPS, why not the veterans?
Another problem with medications shipped via USPS is the lack of climate control in rural mailboxes. Curiously, one medication my husband gets is a drug with a narrow temp range of 68-77F. The VA has had USPS leave it in our mailbox 300′ from the house, no concern for whether it’s January or July, and no signature required, but If we pick it up at the Walmart pharmacy we are required to show a photo ID because it is a controlled substance. Explain that one.
I received an email from my CPA the other day. Basically stating the the IRS no longer wants you to pay your income taxes through the mail system, e-payment only. So the government doesn’t even have any confidence in their capability. The other thing is that if you mail your property tax money in you may incur a late charge, since it goes by the postmark date on the letter, which could take as long as 2 days before its actually processed through the mail.
I got a text message from a health provider that I was in late-payment status on a bill I had no knowledge of. The text arrived on the 15th. I paid online on the 16th. On the 19th, I received a letter that had been mailed to me on THE 1ST, telling me I had to pay the billed amount by the 12th. THIS IS HAPPENING due to all the cost saving improvements over the past ten years in the US postal system.