USPS made $76M profit in April (before $458M retiree health charge turned it into a loss)
TweetUpdate: as a reader pointed out, we included current retiree’s health benefit payments in the original story- the numbers below have been corrected. As our reader also pointed out, the fact remains that the USPS would still be in the black without the RHBTF charge.
The US Postal Service would have shown a net profit of $76 million in April had it not been for the $458 million charge for future retiree health benefits (RHBTF) imposed by Congress. Unaudited financial results released yesterday show that for the fiscal year to date, the USPS has lost $2.3 billion. Without the RHBTF charge, the USPS would be showing a net profit of over $1 billion, despite the continuing decline in mail volume.
Revenue for April was up very slightly from the prior year (+0.01%), although for the year to date it’s still down by 2.3%. Most of the improvement was in standard mail, where volume increased by 1%, and revenue by 3.3% for the month. First class volume was down 3.8% from the prior year, which is actually an improvement from previous months. There was more standard than first class mail in the system for the month.
Expenses for the month were down very slightly from the prior year, with salaries and benefits payments decreasing by almost 2%. That’s not as big a reduction as the service had been making in prior months. City delivery payroll expenses actually increased by 1%. Overtime pay continues to be up from the prior year. Year to date, the USPS has spent $1.6 billion on overtime, up 8% from 2009. Grievance arbitration awards year to date have cost the USPS $84 million, up from $68 million for the same period last year.
May 25th, 2010 10:06
I think you’re wrong. i think this number is the current AND future retiree health obligation. Numbers are still good, and profitable, just not as good as you portray.
I think about 200 million of that 650 is the current retiree cost and 450 M is the future retiree cost….
Could you verify and confirm?
May 25th, 2010 11:43
Offer us a buyout so we can leave and then they can offer lower salaries to the individuals who would be replacing us. The PO would save millions in salaries.
May 25th, 2010 13:45
why not show this to prc, congress, etc….
May 25th, 2010 16:51
This is based on a report that was filed with the PRC.
May 25th, 2010 17:28
Mail volume is not declining.In 2007 the post office put 102 mail processing machines on line that process 16,00 pieces of mail per hour. Pitney Bowes CEO, Murray Martin in an interview with the Wall Street Journal stated that his company expects to resume 20% anual profit projections soon. When asked if snail mail was disapearing. Mr.Martin responded that his company will be supplieing China with machines that will process 25,000 pieces of mail per hour(each). This will reduce the cost of processing 1000 pieces of mail to $1.50-$1.75 per 1000 pieces. He said that because of the Internet, direct advertising mail is increasing exponentially. The machines that will be introduced in Cina have been in operation here since 2007. India and Africa are next. Pitney Bowes is the primary equipment manufacturer of postal equipment. The rise of the company directly corresponds to the automation of the post office. It will continue to do so. Postal employees got the bugs out of the equipment at no cost to Pitney Bowes. Now these same employees are being forgotten and kicked aside. Mail processing is being highjacked by postal management. The mail processing business is being given to the independent mail processors that were created by the post ofice. These compnies are also given tax free leases on the same equipment that is being sent to China.These companies are given discounts for processing mail that is not monoitored for deliery. They are also allowed to store this mail and the contracts run for years. I still get mail that is addressed to my mother who died in 1994. The post office generates $100 million per hr. during peek season. The post office gets a 10 day float to verify delivery of the mail which is pid for in advance. In 2004 testimony was given to the Senate that 23% of the mail is not delivered. So 23% of $100 million per hr is not accounted for. This is tax free money. Please tell me where the money is being lost?
May 25th, 2010 18:17
john…those numbers are right it’s 5.8 billion for future benefits…for 10 years and 2.1 billion for current retired workes..almost 8 billion total…get rid of the future payments,which no company in the world has to pay and profits are there..credit the 75 billion back and things are really good…then work on mngt waste and continue cuts where needed..get rid of the bonus program and the usps will be good for another 100 years
May 25th, 2010 20:33
The postal service is a master manipulator of numbers. It seems though all numbers show us still profitable if we were not prefunding retirement.
Losses would not be as great either if we had not purchased million dollar machinery that is still arriving with no mail to put on it. These machines will never pay for themselves.
In Lieu of doing what every other business in the country would do- cut from the top down, people that never touch or physically help with revenue, processing, or delivery; the post office again is back asward by cutting from the bottom up! Cutting jobs that supply revenue, move the mail for citizens, and insure delivery out on the streeets.
APWU/ NALC- a merger needs to take place.
Moving mail with the current technology should have cut management needs, but they have instead increased the numbers in Washington headquarters with those who play with numbers, write reports, and play the public. These jobs are nothing but an expense.
We need workers driving the trucks, working on the workroom floors, manning the retail windows, and delivering mail on the streets!
Discounts to large mailers? I can understand discounts to the blind, libraries, politicians, etcc… But why do we give billions away to large mailers of advertisements for profit? Everyone pays their fair share!!!! Justify or discontinue the discounts above the processing costs for all agencies that make a profit at postal expense for the public.
Give the average citizen at 44 cents per letter a break, and charge more than a quarter for these large profit making businesses!
May 25th, 2010 20:54
Look at the grievance awards- 87 million. For those of you that don’t know, thats our great managers costing the PO money by not following the contract. Take it out of their paychecks when they disobey the contract that the USPS also signed off on.
May 25th, 2010 23:26
we are in an age where we don’t need a post master for every office, if you cut them and have one for every 5 offices that would save the p.o millions
May 26th, 2010 06:10
Mark, the post office is a tax exempt monopoly it does not purchase the equipment that is used to process the mail. The equipment is provided to the post office and modified on a tax free lease. The independent mail processor is given the same lease arrangement by the post office. The independent mail processors were created by the post office in anticapation of the transfer of the mail processing business to these concerns after all of the postal workers are eliminated. Mr.Potter and the gang will be in line for big kickbacks when the deal is done. Mail processing contracts with independent mail processors run for years. The mail is storred indefinitly. I still get mail addressed to my mother who died in 1994.The next letter you get that is prepaid mail, look for a date on it.
May 26th, 2010 07:08
Allen- you forgot to mention Potter’s involvement with 9/11, the balloon boy hoax, and the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby. Seriously- where do you come up with this stuff? Don’t you think the issues are interesting enough without having to make stuff up? That last part about your mother still getting mail was just plain creepy. I hate to have to ask you this, but you DID report her death, didn’t you? Are we going to read about someone making a shocking discovery in your freezer??
May 26th, 2010 20:56
as the post office keeps laying on more layers of fat at the top, this house will eventually fall like a house made out of a deck of cards
May 28th, 2010 07:39
Mr.Bates, you sound like you wish to be one of Mr.Potter’s underlings.In 2006 Mr.Potter came to the Oakland Distribution Center to make sure that the overhead conveyors were removed to prepair for the recieving of new mail processing equionment.The overhead conveyors should have been removed in 1989 after the Loma Prieta earthquake.They were retained to store and hide the mail.In 2002 a man was nearly electrocuted while working on the equipment.The accident was covered up.I was the first Maintenance Craft Director for the A.P.W.U. in Oakland.The Union’s lack of influance and the adoption of the Hatch Act Amendments allowed the the post office to become the criminal enterprize that it is.My email is allensanford @ sbcglobal.net.I’ll send you a copy of the “Whistle-blower complaint with refrences to the documentation that will make you aware of what the reality of the situation is.If you are intrested in reality that is! The mail that I get that is addressed to my mother is real. I wouldn’t get that mail if it wasn’t being storred like it was being stored in Oakland.I was involved, that’s where I get this “stuff”.Have you ever been involved in anything?
May 28th, 2010 18:51
Allen- please, son, just take your medication, and then let me out of the attic!!
May 30th, 2010 11:26
@Allen – Some people already believe what they want to believe, and any amount of proof isn’t going to change that fact.
@Everyone – The post office has three main problems, and they are the future retiree health benefits, poor management, and the Union. No other company, public or private, has this crazy obligation. Also, the post office is constantly over paying it.
I’m in IT, and I see how poorly the IT operation is being run. You have companies contracted to build and support systems like Surface Visibility, PostalOne, and others that has no sense of following process. Mistakes are made constantly due to lack following process, and basic common sense. I was shocked how things were done at postal.
Last but not least, the UNION! Spending most of my professional career in the private sector, I realize the need for a good Union or for the government to enforce the labor laws. The main problem I have with the Union is that it protects worker’s that really needs to be let go. If you work in the plants, carry mail, or at a window you know what I’m talking about. You have people that know the contract like the back of their hands, and find ways to exploit it. It’s a given that management will try to get away with anything that it can, but you have people coming to work and doing nothing the entire time but socializing. Some people need the fear of losing their jobs in order for them to perform at work.
May 30th, 2010 17:38
Outsider- I don’t disagree with you about the USPS IT mess, but i disagree on the union. First of all, consider that you, along with every other USPS employee, benefit financially from the wages the unions have negotiated. I was in management for most of my career, but I know full well that I made more than I would have otherwise because craft employees made as much as they did. As far as the union representing employees who should be fired- of course they do! That’s what we call due process. Every murderer and rapist who deserves to be executed gets to be defended by the best legal advice available. Someone being fired for misconduct fro the USPS certainly deserves to at least have an advocate to insure that the contract is followed. If there are loopholes in the contract, then shame on the USPS for signing the contract!
And as far as Allen is concerned- don’t tell me you really believe his nonsense about the USPS “storring” mail since 1994 for delivery now. Please? And just for the record, Allen has no “proof”- if he did he’d provide it.