Dive Brief:
- The U.S. Postal Service's delivery performance faltered during the peak holiday shipping season, according to data released by the agency Friday.
- On-time delivery rates for the first quarter of fiscal year 2024, which ran from Oct. 1 to Dec. 29, declined both year-over-year and sequentially in the Postal Service's First-Class Mail, Marketing Mail and Periodicals categories.
- The average time for the Postal Service to deliver a package or mailpiece in the final week of the quarter was 2.7 days, slower than the 2.5 days during the comparable period a year earlier.
USPS peak season on-time delivery rate
| Oct. 1 through Dec. 30, 2022 | Oct. 1 through Dec. 29, 2023 | |
|---|---|---|
| First-Class Mail | 90.1% | 85.4% |
| Marketing Mail | 94% | 93.8% |
| Periodicals | 84.7% | 80.8% |
Source: U.S. Postal Service
Dive Insight:
Postmaster General and CEO Louis DeJoy expressed confidence last year that the Postal Service was "ready to handle any peak season volume in a superior and routine manner." But the agency said Friday that operational disruptions hobbled its performance during the busy shipping stretch.
Disruptions included the bankruptcy of an unnamed supplier that forced it to insource several Surface Transfer Centers, which are contracted facilities that handle volume in the agency's ground transportation network. Additionally, a critical processing facility in St. Louis was closed for decontamination due to a mercury leak from an illegally shipped package.
Despite the hurdles, the Postal Service said about 96% of all packages and mail were delivered within a day of specified service standards.
"The very small percentage of mail that is not delivered within this time frame is often the result of broader staffing and hiring issues within the local economies that we are working aggressively to address," the agency said in a news release.
Still, the Postal Service will need to shake off disruptions and improve its on-time delivery performance if it's to meet the goals of its 10-year transformation plan. That plan, known as Delivering for America, aims to have the agency meet or exceed 95 percent on-time service performance for all mail and shipping products.
"With the implementation of the Delivering for America plan, the Postal Service continues its focus on improving service reliability for the American public and business customers by modernizing the outmoded and aging postal network across the nation," the agency said.
