Postal Customer Satisfaction Score Reaches Four-Year High
WASHINGTON—Despite continuing economic challenges, the Postal Service (USPS) continues to deliver high levels of service, with 94 percent of customers surveyed rating USPS as “excellent, very good or good” in the period July 1 to Sept. 30, 2009.
“Customer service and satisfaction are always our priorities,” said Postmaster General John Potter. “The Postal Service remains focused on its mission to provide universal, affordable service to all Americans.” Potter said he is pleased with the 94 percent rating — the highest in four years — and USPS will build on the achievement to reach even higher levels. Prior to the 94 percent rating, USPS received a 93 percent rating of “excellent, very good or good” for five consecutive quarters.
“We will continue to improve service,” Potter pledged. “In fact, we have implemented an even more demanding service measurement system that will allow us to see more easily where we need to focus improvement efforts,” he said.
USPS is implementing the new Customer Experience Measurement (CEM) program, effective with the start of fiscal year 2010, replacing the Customer Satisfaction Measurement program that has been in place since 1991.
CEM is designed to evaluate the total customer experience, from the buying process through service quality. Insights and information from the new measurement system will allow the Postal Service to pinpoint areas of improvement as well as better adjust to changing customer needs. The new system will allow USPS to collect and analyze data from customer surveys and other sources for a more detailed view of customer feedback.
“CEM will help the Postal Service better understand our customers’ perspective,” said Vice President and Consumer Advocate Delores Killette. “By measuring customers’ experiences across all contact points, the Postal Service will build stronger customer relationships and become a more customer-focused organization.”
Killette introduced the new system at today’s Board of Governors meeting, along with the fourth-quarter national performance scores. In addition to the 94 percent customer satisfaction rating, other highlights of on-time mail delivery scores are:
* 96 percent for Single-Piece First-Class Mail overnight delivery for the fourth consecutive quarter
* 95 percent for two-day delivery, up 1 percentage point over last quarter
* 94 percent for three-to-five-day delivery, up 1 percentage point over last quarter.
Other Board Matters
Also at today’s board meeting, Louis Giuliano was elected chairman and Thurgood Marshall, Jr., was elected vice chairman of the board. Giuliano previously served as vice chairman and was appointed a governor by President George W. Bush in 2004. He is former CEO and President of ITT Corp., where he was responsible for leading the creation of a strategic vision and an effective operating strategy for this Fortune 500 global-industrial company. Marshall, an attorney in Washington, DC, and former member of the Clinton Administration White House senior staff, was appointed a governor by President Bush in 2006.
In his opening remarks, Postmaster General Potter noted that this was the first open session board meeting since legislation passed that lowered the Postal Service’s 2009 payment to the Retiree Health Benefit Trust Fund by $4 billion. Potter said the Postal Service is grateful to Congress and the Administration for the welcome adjustment. “However, we must recognize that the Postal Service faces the same problem again this year and every year in the near future as volume contracts and we struggle to match the costs of an expanding delivery network with revenue received,” he said. “It is clear as we move into 2010 that long-term success will require fundamental, legislative change.”
The USPS Integrated Financial Plan for 2010 will be released next week, as will the Postal Service’s 2009 end-of-year financial results.
November 13th, 2009 13:52
Service is great, and to make it even better Potter wants to eliminate one day of delivery, down to five. Doesn’t sound like someone that is concerned about service.
November 13th, 2009 18:55
This is the funniest thing I have ever read. The final S in USPS stand for system because there is no service. Heck my post office is locked from 4:30 p.m. until 8:00 a.m. and over the weekend. How can I get mail when there is no service? Give me a break. The USPS should just close up, sell out to FedEx and fade away into obscurity.
November 13th, 2009 19:29
Who stuffed that ballot box? Let’s see what the employee satisfaction score is.
November 14th, 2009 07:07
Thank all of the carriers for this rating, I would love to see it broken down. Service at the window satifaction? Customer complaints handled by supervision? Hours of operation issues? All of the questions reported out by catagory so we can really see which aspects of the postal service are getting the highest ratings. If the PMG thinks we should continue to close offices and cuts days of service he is totally out of touch with reality. He will make another VP and their staff to look at the numbers for another $500K this year.
November 14th, 2009 22:03
Carriers? Mail handlers? They are NOT the ones leaving such wonderful ratings. Perhaps it’s the union workers kissing butt, while they make deals to save their jobs in their state while the workers ( up to 20 year long employees) are at risk of being sent out of state. People who don’t know people that work for the post office will never know the endless stress and insanity they are subjected to due to miss management and budgeting problems.
November 19th, 2009 17:37
They sure didn’t ask me, quality of service has gone down drastically. We currently ship between 200 and 300 first class packages (6×9 envelope, couple of ounces) a day. Starting 4 or 5 months ago around 50 percent of our first class parcels started taking over 2 weeks to deliver. A lot of them are still undelivered after 3 or 4 weeks. The Van Nuys, CA postmaster even came out to our office, but can’t figure out why it takes so long. UPS ground is reliably delivered anywhere in the continental US in 7 days or less. The post office is so badly run it just can’t compete anymore. It’s not the postal carriers, it’s management that’s bad.
November 20th, 2009 18:43
How can this be when all we ever get is bad press.Is there two worlds, the real one and the one Postalnews lives in.The ship is sinking and customers are complaining about long wait time in line,PO closing,plants closing.Sorry but I am totally confused by this article.Could this be more management lies.