Is the USPS a Business or a Service?

Is the USPS a Business or a Service?
By Dee Perez
NAPS Northeast Region Vice President

The United States Post Office was established on July 26, 1775, by the Second Continental Congress; Benjamin Franklin was appointed the first postmaster general. After 260 years, many of us are confused about exactly what we are today.

Are we a business, as postal leadership often states? Are we a service to the American public, as Congress and the public believe we are? Or are we both?

In my opinion, we are a service; we can’t be both. I owned and built my own small business when I was 23 years old and sold it when I was 27. I worked 80 to 90 hours a week, seven days a week. I had a stationery card and gift store with a lottery machine.

My parents owned an Exxon gas station that also did car repairs for 36 years before selling it. My dad, at age 86, since has downsized. He established and owns a car repair shop with three mechanics.

I will be retiring from the USPS with 38 years of service before he decides to retire, which embarrasses me.

My point of sharing my family work history is I am fully aware of what a business is. I know the difference between being a service and being a business.

I have no issues with postal leadership claiming we are a business and instilling a philosophy and business acumen in what they are trying to achieve, while expecting all EAS employees to adapt to their philosophy. They are the leaders of whatever we are; our jobs are to try to make the idea work every day.

But it’s difficult for me to accept billion-dollar losses each year. No real business can survive this, although government agencies that offer public services and have been around for over 250 years can survive.

I am not saying USPS leadership is wrong for adopting a business-type outlook and using the technology at their fingertips to pinpoint their losses and figure out how to eliminate them. As easily as leadership has adapted to the technology and passed it on to EAS employees on the front lines, identifying which employees are failing to meet the company/service goals locally and allowing local management to correct these failures is acceptable and understood. But meeting goals does not mean the yearly debt will be eliminated.

USPS leadership fails to understand the core job of their postmasters, managers and supervisors. The added data reports and daily Zoom accountability meetings due to KPI failures take away hours of valuable time, preventing EAS employees from performing their core responsibilities.

These EAS employees are expected to be analytical experts on every report known to mankind. This has become overwhelming because these employees already have more responsibilities than they possibly can handle on a daily basis.

No business I’m aware of continues to pile on more reports and responsibilities to its core management employees without understanding their current workload — never eliminating anything and continually piling on more. In the NFL, piling on is a penalty; it should be the same for the USPS.

Branches, please try to sign three new members a month. MM — membership matters!